Combine the lyrics of the artsy, punk kid who sits alone at the back of French class, with the sounds that come from the muscle head's new crotch-rocket, and you have Ok Go!'s debut release. Either way, their CD strangely feels like your old high school's hallways with better rhythm. That's not necessarily a bad thing. OK Go! is making quite a name for itself after touring with current popular and youthful acts-namely The Vines and The Donnas. There's nothing too original about their loud three-chord pop, not even Weezer can claim to have derived this, but their first solid album, OK Go!, is one you'll listen to whether you're angry and angsty, or just want to dance. Their songs are mainly a mix of pop anthems and shoe-gazing emo tracks, yet pieces of everything else fall in between. From the first song-also their first single-"Get Over It," you get the sense that Ok Go! is super catchy but also pretty dumb.

"Get Over It" is certainly the best song on the album, and is supposedly a real crowd-pleaser at concerts. It starts out with a beat reminiscent of Queen's "We Will Rock You," and fists fly in the air as everyone sings, "HEY! Get get get get get over it! Hey!" This is an excellent, cathartic song. If you are angry at someone or something, sing along to this song at the top of your lungs and you'll feel a lot better. This song is the most musically intricate on the album, with its use of an organ and Def Leppard-esque background vocals. There is even a Bends-era Radiohead-style guitar break at one point in the song. The song also has a similar feel to "Love Stinks" by the J. Geils Band.

The other standout song on the album is "You're So Damn Hot." However, the theme of these two songs is very similar-an attractive girl who can get away with treating men badly because of her fine physical appearance. "Get Over it" is about someone who complains all the time about the attractive girl while at the same time, he thinks that she is wonderful. The sentiment is best expressed in the lyrics, "Ain't it just a bitch? What a pain.../Well it's all a crying shame/ What left to do but complain?/Better find someone to blame." It is a little bit faster than "Get Over It" and doesn't have the fist-pumping beat. Thus, it is a lot more pop than rock. The simplistic lyrics include, "You don't love me at all, but don't think that it bothers me at all."

Track two "Don't Ask Me" could be about the same girl as "You're So Damn Hot" and "Get Over It." It is a fast and catchy song, which is, again, about a girl-probably an ex-girlfriend who he hasn't seen in a while-who is insensitive to others. Of course, this entire CD is following the emo mantra of pain and anguish.

The fourth track, "What to Do," is probably the song with the most meaningful lyrics on the album with the line, "mediocre people do exceptional things all the time." It's open to interpretation whether this is meant as a motivation or a criticism. One interpretation could be that vocalist, Damian Kulash, is putting down the girl in question by saying that she is not as great as she thinks she is. It also features a nice little guitar solo. However, the album goes down hill from here.

Track five is a pleasant but ordinary love song about driving around aimlessly past "wheat fields and water towers." It starts out with a similar beat to "Get Over It," but is much slower. With very unoriginal and clichd lyrics.

"Shortly Before the End" is a slow, nondescript song about dying, or possibly, a dying love. It is pretty, but not extraordinary. "Sing us a song to hum through the hours of dying." There are only eight lines of lyrics in the entire song-some are repeated-and the instrumentation is not very interesting. It gets very boring after a while.

The next track, "Return," is another nice but ordinary-sounding song, although it is better than the previous two tracks, as the lyrics are rather poetic at times. It seems to be about someone whose life was cut short. The saddest part is when he sings, "I can't remember your face."
"There's a "Fire" and "Bye Bye Baby" are very blah songs. And, besides, isn't it kind of lame to end an album with "bye bye, baby?"

"C-C-C-Cinnamon Lips" is my least favorite song on the album. It is sung by Tim Nordwind in a whiny falsetto and it features yet another J. Geils-esque beat. This song is about unrequited love, and Norwind sings "Someday (one day) you'll miss me." This line is strangely reminiscent of ever other unrequited love song.

Track 10 sounds a bit more original with its swingy feel, but it sounds a bit thin. It's about decisions, using the played-out metaphor of forks in the road and missed turns. But at one point he sings, "Let's go back to Boston," which is heartening to local listeners.

"Hello My Treacherous Friends" is a rather bizarre song. Kulash uses a lower, semi-creepy tone as he sings, "Hello, my treacherous friends." Could this be alluding to spiders? I'm not sure what this song is about, but at least it's not just another mundane love song. This album certainly didn't need another one of those.

Overall, this album is worth a quick run through, but don't base your emo needs upon it.