Nada Surf - I Like What You Say (City Slang)
1/5
By: Michael Cragg
I'm guessing there were a huge amount of bands, not just from America, that mourned the passing of TV's The O.C. Each week's episode would be sound-tracked by copious amounts of heartfelt, earnest bands whose lovelorn lyrics gave perfect aural accompaniment to the problems faced by the beautiful teens on screen.
Sometimes Marissa (yeah, I watched it too!) and Ryan would argue about, you know, life and stuff, and things would get so hard they'd rush back in their 4x4s and blast out some BellX1 or the new Death Cab For Cutie and their problems would melt away. For the bands it gave the kind of exposure they could only dream of, and listening to 'I Like What You Say', the first single from Nada Surf's fifth album Lucky, you can't help but feel that they've aimed for The O.C crowd a little after the horse has bolted.
To call 'I Like What You Say' flimsy would be doing flimsy things a huge injustice, it's cutesy, jingle-jangle melody and depressing need to please as infuriating as its uninspired lyrics; "You say I like what you say/ I like what you say/ You say I like what you say..." and so on, ad infinitum. To make matters worse is the fact that the accompanying album, on paper at least, seems to have much more going for it, with guest appearances from Juliana Hatfield, Ed Harcourt and members of Death Cab For Cutie and Calexico. But if 'I Like What You Say' is meant to represent the best of the bunch then I'm thankful I only got the single to review.
Artists in this article: Nada Surf
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