Reviews

Fake Problems' second album, How Far Our Bodies Go, comes in bright, neon orange packaging.  It practically blinded me.  You can spot it from twelve feet away, so it shouldn't be hard to find in stores.  It actually glows when placed behind other CDs, the orange light just radiates out from the sides.  For serious.
 
If I could quickly describe this album in a phrase, I’d say it was a campfire album. I can just imagine sitting with the band on some logs around a fire, singing along with Chris and his acoustic guitar.  And then a second guitar comes in, a little bass, some drums and a dude with a fiddle, maybe a horn section pops up and joins our circle.  Cool, let’s sing and roast us some marshmallows.
 
The album starts off with some acoustic guitar and callback vocals.  The title track is short and sweet and flows into “Born & Raised,” a tongue-in-cheek number about growing up.  Chris on going back to college: “I do agree the experience sounds quite enticing/If I don’t get too distracted by all the drinking/But if I went I would make the best of every moment/I’d pay attention to the teacher and come home/with some knowledge, or something great like that.”  Well anyway, I thought it was funny.
 
“Maestro of the Rebellion” introduces that fiddle in a unique way that blends well with the band’s neo-folk-punk-rock whatever you want to call it, and even throws in some horns.  “Busy Bees” introduces the mandolin, which will be featured in the next couple songs and actually helps tie in my whole campfire theme with some wilderness lyrics.
 
“Crest on the Chest” is one of my favorite songs; it kind of has a wandering man feel and picks up the tempo.  “To Repel Ghosts” builds to a pretty big ending which falls to a slow tempo in the next song, followed by the more upbeat “Heck Yeah Summer!” and “Staying & Leaving As Living & Dying.”
 
“Life’s A Drink, Get Thirsty” features a fun slide guitar and includes some more of those sincere yet humorous lyrics.  For example, “And why can’t you let me be without ever leaving me?/And why, oh, why can’t you be someone who is not killing me?”  The last song, “Para Tu,” is one of those great last album songs, building to a finish that seems to wrap up the whole thing.
 
Now there’s just one more thing that can’t be avoided.  Against Me!  Yeah, Fake Problems does sound like Against Me!  This was my first thought, but after the second listen, I was really able to appreciate the album on its own.
 
So while there is a bit of an early AM! nod going on here, the production quality is way better than early AM!, even though Fake Problems comes off the same Gainesville label which first recorded AM!  The label, Sabot Productions, has a pretty solid catalogue including None More Black, Lucero and Communique.
 
So may I suggest throwing some batteries in the old boombox, grabbing this CD and heading to some nearby campground to revel in this both high-quality AND fun album.  Or you could just play it in your apartment while drinking Smore flavored Schnapps.  But then you’d have to reclaim the south for the Confederacy and we don’t want that.