The Prom
Under The Same Stars (Barsuk)
The Prom
Under The Same Stars (Barsuk)
by Marc Hirsh
originally published in Space City Rock, Fall 2003
Dragged towards melodicism possibly by the piano that occupies center stage,
the Prom’s Under The Same Stars delivers songs that are mildly tuneful,
if devoid of any shred of originality. Singer James Mendenhall has a voice
that marries Matt McCaughan and Colin Moulding, a band that makes Counting
Crows sound like the Attractions and a wounded-romantic lyrical bent that
would make a high schooler blush. With big, dysphonious words strewn about
(a result, perhaps, of confusing complication with complexity), we get lines
like, “I know that I look awkwardly alone waiting so patiently next to the
phone” (which is, interestingly, done in not by the “awkwardly” so much as
that almost invisible “so”) when not being forced to navigate mixed similes
such as, “These songs are like letters. I employ my pen to write. The ink
on the paper, like tears waiting to dry.” Ben Folds it ain’t.