Fans of the Junior Varsity will recognize this two-disc package as a deluxe reissue of their first full-length album, originally released in 2004 on the British label. Following the band's signing to Victory Records and the success of its second LP, the Junior Varsity decided to resurrect its indie debut with a generously expanded program that includes almost a full album's worth of additional tracks as well as a bonus DVD filled with documentary material and live footage. The original album has aged pretty well: the band's sound, circa 2004, was big and dense, messy on the surface but tightly crafted beneath. Singer
Asa Dawson has one of those endearingly regular-guy Midwestern voices who sometimes sounds a bit like
Robert Smith ("Introduction to the Faint Remembrance of a Dead and Dying Dream") and sometimes a bit like
Freedy Johnston ("Peter Cottontail and the Demise of the Carrot Tree"). The band itself isn't above indulging a prog rock tendency every once in a while; the opening bars of "I Sang a Song to Be Sung," for example, almost sound like an outtake from
Rush's Moving Pictures. That said, and as you may have already noticed, the band also has a less-than-endearing affinity for cutesy song titles, but luckily you don't have to listen to a song title. Fans will love the documentary footage and the surprisingly varied and fully realized demo tracks. Recommended.
