Favorite Albums of 2010: Rogue Wave - Permalight

Rogue Wave, We Will Make A Song Destroy

Permalight (2010)

From time to time I will listen to internet radio stations.  There's a lot of noise-to-sound going on, but every once in awhile a gem will pop up.  A couple of years ago I was listening and I heard this song I really liked.  I looked and it was a song called Phonytown by the band Rogue Wave.  I surfed around and found a few other songs, and they were all pleasant enough, so I bought the album (Asleep at Heaven's Gate) and have been tracking down their other stuff (I still need to get one called Descended Like Vultures).  The more I read about them, the more I realized I had no business liking the band because the songs are awfully happy (not to trigger a saccharine overdose, but they were even in some shitty Jennifer Aniston movie...I don't mean a song of theirs was used in the soundtrack, I mean the band was actually in the movie.  What's worse, they weren't just in it the way the The Afghan Whigs were in Beautiful Girls or Oingo Boingo were in Back To School, they were like this sweet band the guy wanted to see but the tickets were sold out so Jennifer Aniston pulled off some charming electrical truck stunt to get the guy to see the band he liked...I hate myself for knowing that much, by the way).  

The lead singer is a guy who goes by the name Zach Rogue, and as the story goes he lost his Silicon Valley job in the dot com bust in the early part of the decade, and went on a sort of soul searching pilgrimage across the country.  His trek resulted in the recording of their first album, Out of the Shadow. Since then there have been a few line up changes and I think even one of their members died or something, but their albums are consistently really good.  It's all pretty mellow, pretty uplifting synth pop stuff.  It is great driving music if you're going on a spring or summertime road trip. 

I got Permalight when it came out this year, and I really like it.  Maybe that's a product of my therapist's admonition to start listening to happier music, but maybe it's actually good.  I'm not sure.  Give it a listen and let me know what you think.