Keep It Together

First off, college rock as a genre is inanimately inert. Really though, the one-time reliable genre has too many highs and lows to be subjected to taxonomy. There's frat rock, indie rock and obscurities - that's what the dorms are stealing off the Internet these days. Guster are an odd incarceration of a crossover band; they're comfortable enough for the rush week car rides and deft enough for the easygoing indie radical. Nothing against the frat genre. It has it's place, really, but poor Guster, they deserve way better than their fan base's fickle tendencies. 

A decade before falling off the top of the pop rock world, REM went from being the primordial kings of credible college rock to a mainstay on commercial radio. Not to imply that Guster could play Dirk Calloway to REM's Max Fischer, but the two bands are alike in that neither band seems properly suited for their roll n' rock music.

Humor me, but could it be that Keep it Together is to Guster what Life's Rich Pageant was to REM, both great pop rock albums that won't ever get their dues? While not quite as jangly as REM, Keep it Together is brimming full of could-be radio hits, most eminently the already semi-smash "Amsterdam," which has seen the same meek success as Pageant's "Fall on Me."

Both "Amsterdam" and "Careful" are great pop accomplishments, but it's "I Hope Tomorrow is Like Today" (featuring Ben Kweller) that stands out as the album's real zenith. "Jesus on the Radio" is a banjo-driven sing-a-long that offers the only real break away from the otherwise straight-ahead pop-rock sound.

Truly grand pop rock albums are hard to come by, particularly understated ones. Keep it Together is thus far the high point of Guster's short career. If they can build off of their current sound we might be in for a treat. Find The Jayhawks' realm, guys. Find it.   7/10

Written by G. William Locke