LogFAQs > #967798704

The Ataris - So Long, Astoria results

The participants sorted by deviation from final results:
MetalmindStats (22)
BlueCrystalTear (40)
cyko (40)
ChichiriMuyo (44)
HBJDubs (44)
Raetsel_Lapin (48)
StifledSilence (54)
Seanchan (70)
Johnbobb (82)

General Album Comments

colliding: I'm not playing along with the ranking but I do think this is the first time I've seen an album I would legitimately describe as "bad" being included.

masterplum: Oh hey I love this album

Seanchan: I've listened to this album dozens of times over the years. I'm not going to pretend it's an all-time classic or anything like that, because I don't think it is. But I keep coming back to it. Best I can tell, it's two reasons: 1) there's a certain karaoke singalong quality to a lot of these songs that just puts me in a good mood, 2) it's produces a hammer blow of nostalgia for places, times, and experiences I've never had. I recognize there's a certain dichotomy between those two things, and yet it just works for me. It's just a wonderful work that manages to be both catchy and down to earth at the same time.

FoolFantastic: Half the stuff here sounded to me like the montage transition music of a mid-2000s teen drama. The other half was rejected Sonic the Hedgehog background music. I already find pop-punk vaguely annoying and this had the added layer of being overly long and largely generic. I got a headache a few tracks in. The only moment that felt okay to me was a cover song, of which I greatly prefer the original.

Seanchan: I can see the merit of your some of your criticism. The album is a little bit too long, though I feel like we could say that for a lot of the albums we've covered. I don't know how old the band members were in 2003 but I'd imagine having a sound of a "mid-2000s teen drama" makes sense. Pop-punk in general just skews to that late teen demo. Not sure I get the Sonic stuff but then again I've played almost none of those games post-Genesis.

colliding: There are all-time classic pop-punk albums but this isn't one of them. Blue Skies, Broken Hearts Next 12 Exits is a much better effort from this band. This was their major label debut and the result is an album that's overall way too polished, safe, and long.

BlueCrystalTear: One listen down. I kinda enjoyed this. The thing I didn't ... was how redundant this was. Like I couldn't tell you which song was which, for the most part. A good way to make songs stand out is to balance out the rockers with some ballads. Instead, this is a record where every song reeks of its time, with no variety. Not even the "Boys of Summer" cover feels like it's faithful enough to the original to create the deviance the album needed. Don Henley did not approve of the butchering of that iconic lyric, did he?

I can see why FoolFantastic didn't want to rank this. It's not their cup of tea so hearing the same three songs five times apiece is going to annoy the crap out of them - no differently than things like System of a Down or Mos Def grating me, since those aren't my thing. But, for me, this was more along the lines of Black Marble or Opeth in how difficult it is to rank the tracks despite still enjoying this for what it is.

StifledSilence: I like this one a lot. Definitely among a number of albums I grew up listening to. The themes of nostalgia, fond memories, and missing home resonate hard with me. Then you have the emotional response to a fan letter that really stuck with me over the years, My Reply, that is truly a highlight of the album. The first four tracks are bangers, Boys of Summer is one of my favorite covers of all time, and the rest of the album is pretty good too. The ones I ranked 11-14 didnt hit as hard with me as the rest of the album, but they arent duds or anything.

ChichiriMuyo: I've never really listened to The Ataris and going into this I had a feeling Boys of Summer would be the only song of *ahem* theirs that I had ever heard. It probably is, but I can't be sure, because every song sounds like something I've heard a million times. As has been mentioned this album kind of sounds like the embodiment of a mid-early 2000s movie/TV script saying *insert generic pop punk song here*. I don't hate it, really, but I feel uninspired and unfulfilled by the experience. If it weren't for Boys of Summer (and the one acoustic track) I would have to say absolutely nothing about it stands out to me, and even that just makes me want to listen to other versions of that song rather than continue with this album. Maybe in an alternate reality this could have been the soundtrack to my life at 20, but by the time this album came out I was past any band that would write lyrics like "all the cool kids crowding around the air hockey table." Sadly since so many songs are so same-y there's a part of me that thinks the following list is in order of "how long I listened before I was bored." Well, except My Reply... I just really did not like that song.

Seanchan: This was a tough one for me to rank. There's not really a single standout song; the first 8 are all pretty close. Then I really enjoy the start of Takeoffs and Landings. After that the rest are in the fine to okay range.

HBJDubs: This is not a memorable album, but it's a good one for when I want to turn my brain off while I'm doing something else. There's definitely a place for those kind of albums even if the individual tracks aren't special.

cyko: Whoa! I didn't think anyone else around here even knew the Ataris, let alone liked them enough to talk about them!!

I absolutely love the Ataris - they were one of my favorite bands during the early 2000s. I still enjoy their music, I've seen them live multiple times and even hung out for a while after one of the shows with the lead singer, Kris Roe, talking about his songwriting and life on the road. Unfortunately, outside of a few songs, So Long Astoria is a pretty mediocre pop-punk album.

"Blue Skies, Broken Hearts: Next 12 Exits" and "End Is Forever" are both SIGNIFICANTLY better albums.
(...)
You know, I haven't listened to this album straight through in a while, but after listening to the album again, it's better than I remember. The lowest 5 songs in my ranking are pretty generic and kind of forgettable, but I do still enjoy the whole album.

There is an acoustic version of Looking Back On Today on a Warped Tour Compilation and I might like that version even more than this version.
There is a different version of I Won't Spend Another Night Alone on their earlier album that is way better. Something about this version feels off...
Whoever said their acoustic stuff is quite good is definitely on to something - It's not on this album, but San Dimas High School Football Rules is one of their best songs and their acoustic version is even better.