Link: Karate High School’s Home Page and Karate High School’s MySpace Page.
The Inside Pulse: With punk sensibilities, MIDI-style synths, and emo lyrics, Karate High School is the newest addition to the burgeoning Nintendo-core movement. Their first album, Arcade Rock, is laced with hard-driving songs intertwined with video-game inspired synthesizers, giving them a sound that stands out in the stale, punk-pop world of today.
Positives: First of all, come on! Who can’t love a band with a name like Karate High School? The opening track, “Good News and Bad News”, starts out like most emo songs today, but the undercurrent of synths makes it stand out more than normal. You’ll find that in all the tracks, as lead singer Paul Maguire’s use of synth gives his songs an extra dimension lacking from most of the current crop of punk-light material. And while most of the lyrics come from the same Dashboard Confessional strain of lyrics popular today, you also get songs like “Sweep The Leg” (the album’s best song), with lyrics like “Put him in a body bag!” It’s emo with a sense of fun that’s usually lacking.
Negatives: Sometimes, like on “88 Million Light Years Away”, the synth goes overboard, rendering the song into just a musical experiment. Plus, as is the drawback with most emo bands, there are only so many songs you can write about having your heart broken before they all blend together.
Cross-breed: Taking Back Sunday fronted by Chester Bennington, if they did the soundtrack for Legend of Zelda.
Reason to buy: Because there’s absolutely nothing wrong with music that sounds fun. And, despite their limitations, Karate High School has made an album that’ll keep your toes tapping and a smile on your face.
