Junior Varsity - Great Compromise [CD/DVD] (CD)

All Music Guide

Fans of The Junior Varsity will recognize this twodisc package as a deluxe reissue of their first fulllength 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 band 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 regularguy Midwestern voices that 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 progrock tendency every once in a while; the opening bars of "I San...g 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 lessthanendearing affinity for cutesy song titles, but luckily you don't have to listen to a song title. Fans will love the documentaryfootage and the surprisingly varied and fullyrealized demo tracks. Recommended. - Rick Anderson, All Music Guide Read more Less