CASSETTE REVIEW: Booksmart (Jane Tapes)

                Bands like Booksmart are the reason why I love music so much.   What feels like a one man project has the feel of a band such as Weezer, Nirvana or Nada Surf.   I want to call this “bedroom garage”, but I’m not sure if that’s a tag that really makes sense.

                I mean, both of those are technically locations, so does it sound like it came from the room inside the house where you typically sleep or the room attached to the house where you typically keep your car and assorted brick-a-brack? 

                Then I started wondering, what if you lived in your garage.   You couldn’t technically have a “garage band” if you lived in your garage because your bed would be there and then… Wow, this is really a can of worms I feel like I should not have opened.

                To quickly distract myself, I note the Elvis Depressedly cover on this tape and find it quite odd because some people may look at that and ask “Who?”.   I feel like Sad Elvis should have enough of a following to not make this too tricky, but I feel like cover songs are usually of bands that everyone (or most everyone) knows and has heard the particular song before. 

                In any event, it’s just funny, because when you think of it as being “mainstream” and “underground” and all that, you go “underground” to a certain level with Elvis Depressedly and now by listening to someone cover him you’re going even further “underground”, like  a sub-underground or under-underground. 

                There is also a song on here that has backup vocals which are female and that particular song reminds me of The Moldy Peaches.   This is a fun set of songs for a cassette though and reminds me why music still needs cassettes. 

http://booksmart.bandcamp.com/
http://janetapes.bandcamp.com/album/no-stars-tonight