The Self-Starter Foundation imprint is far from prolific-- their website even proudly announces, "Averaging almost two records a year since 1995"-- but the records they choose to release range from above average to beyond great. On one side of the fence, there are the winners: Les Savy Fav's first two albums and Lifter Puller's Fiestas and Fiascos; on the other, there are the decent: Haywood's Men Called Him Mister and Enduro's Half Rack of Sugar. Actionslacks' The Scene's Out of Sight falls somewhere in the middle.
Though not nearly as innovative as the art-punk onslaught of Les Savy Fav, Actionslacks' only aim is to make great pop music. Their sights aren't set on pushing music to new peaks; they just want to satiate the pop-deprived with solid hooks and charged delivery. And where so many of their indie pop contemporaries fall victim to asinine, three-chord rehashing and inept guitarwork, Actionslacks overcome with a fierce intensity and inspired songwriting.
The J Robbins-produced The Scene's Out of Sight is the third for the Berkeley, California-based foursome, and betters both its predecessors-- the Skene!-released Too Bright, Just Right, Goodnight from 1996, and 1998's One Word on Arena Rock-- in every respect. The guys are considerably more confident now than on past outings, and they have every right to be; drummer Marty Kelly pulls off complicated fills effortlessly while bassist Ross Murray interplays complex rhythmic structures with singer/guitarist Tim Scanlin's plucked steel strings. Even Scanlin's lyrics have grown up over the years. Sure, he'll still stumble over SweeTart prose like, "Tonight we're gonna scrape the sky," but what he lacks in poetic genius he makes up for in melody.
If there's a complaint to be made about The Scene's Out of Sight, it's that being berated with stories of scenesterism and tour vans gets tired after a while. Surely, there are more important things in life than how many stickers you can slap on newspaper dispensers and the number of shows you went to last week. But power-pop lyrics are renowned for their genericism, and simply put, they're just not the point. If nothing else, these guys are a hell of a lot more skilled with the pen than better-knowns like the Get Up Kids and the Promise Ring.
The Scene's Out of Sight isn't going to change anyone's life, and thankfully, it wasn't meant to. Actionslacks are more than satisfied assaulting "the kids" with their blissful, high-energy performances. And with their most competent album to date for sale at the merch table, it looks like the guys'll be riding the music geek fantasy for at least another five years. Which is really all a Californian power-pop band can ask for.
