Duds of 2008: Part Four

Here are a handful of albums that hardly deserve a full-length review. Duds consist of albums that have received a rating of two stars or less. Didn't expect to have to do it again so soon, but man, there's a lot of bad music out there.

Scars On Broadway (2008, Interscope) Scars On Broadway's first studio album. *1/2

Scars On Broadway don't know if anyone takes them seriously, if they want to be taken seriously, or even if the band takes itself seriously. In fact, they don't seem to know much, including how to write music or that there's more than one chord you can play on a guitar, or, in their own words, how they're going to live forever if they're going to kill each other. They said it, not me.

We Have Cause to Be Uneasy (2008, Canvas Black) Wild Sweet Orange's first studio album. **

You know the people from Wild Sweet Orange, you've seen (but hopefully have not heard) them a million times; young pseudo-hippies who "get" music and "connect" with it more than other people, who boast of quasi-intellectual ideas and made-up memories, but it's okay, because it's all in the spirit of music. The problem? They suck.

@#%&*! Smilers (2008, Superego) Aimee Mann's seventh studio album. **

Nothing against Aimee Mann. Honestly. But this album is boring beyond belief. Look, in a world that is plagued with mediocre and stereotypical female singer-songwriters, you need to stand out. Insinuating a potty-mouth word in the title of your album isn't what I had in mind.