Two Tongues - Two Tongues

Album Release: February 3, 2009

I really, really, really wanted to love this album. The eponymous debut album by Two Tongues, a supergroup comprised of Max Bemis and Coby Linder of Say Anything and Chris Conley and Dave Soloway of Saves the Day , should have been my favorite album of 2009. In theory, this could have been the greatest combination since cold cheese met pizza. In practice, it feels more like a Zonie when it arrives 3 hours after it's ordered: cold, unsatisfying and surprisingly cheesy.

The album falls short of what it could have been, with the exception of "Interlude," sung beautifully by Bemis's fiancee and Eisley lead singer Sherri DuPree, and "Tremors," the "I Got You, Babe" of the Bemis-Conley bromance. Too many lyrics seem settled upon, and too many lines are repeated. How many times can 'come on' be used as a chorus in one album, guys? Lines like "You make me pay every time/Is this love an endless crime" from "Come On" and "You've got your hole, it's where you lay/To writhe, to rot, until your dying day" from "Dead Lizard" sound like very bad poetry written by an angst-ridden high school boy.

The actual music is exactly what it needs to be: a perfect blend of Bemis and Conley. However, there are a few tracks, specifically "Back Against the Wall," that sound too farfetched for anyone to believe Two Tongues wanted to be taken seriously. I could see this music used by Justin Timberlake, but definitely not Bemis or Conley. Max's voice is smooth and one of the more comforting aspects, while Conley's is often shrill and nasal, more so than usual. The dichotomy between the two voices feels forced and often times awkward.

For the Say Anything/Saves the day enthusiast, you will like this record strictly because of the driving forces. It's nothing groundbreaking, it's nothing that's going to top any 'best of 2009' lists, and it may not even be that well remembered, but it is a decent first effort by a band that should have blown me out of the water. I wanted to love this album, but I'll wait for their next one to come out, with lower expectations. They can only go up from here. The album comes out February 3, 2009 on Vagrant Records.

Stream:

Tremors