This is really good stuff. It's not quite great, yet, but I think Mt. St. Helens might be moving in that direction.

While the four fellers in Mt. St. Helens clearly have the Chicago rock scene in their ears, Fugazi seems to loom large in their dreams, and the spirit of Hüsker Dü is never far from the surface. This is pretty, tense, emotional music, with lyrics that will touch anyone who's ever found themselves sitting alone in a field wondering what went wrong. (That includes you, doesn't it?)

"I asked for a pen and you gave it to me. I wanted to write 'It's not easy to fall asleep, with you and one Galaxie 500 CD'".

Don't let the word "emotional" above scare you, though -- we're not talking emo here. Not dry, whiny, self-important emo anyway. There are some weird, funny, touching moments on this CD, and despite a somewhat derivative sound, the songs are memorable and engaging.

While there are a lot of things to like about On Time, Always, the disc suffers from a less than great recording and mix, and the density of many of the tunes ends up obscuring what would otherwise have been some very nice, subtle moments. In general the sound is too muted and diffused, which takes the edge off what I assume are meant to be sharp and precise songs. The vocals are buried in the mix on most of the tracks, which brings back happy memories of trying to figure out what in the hell Bob Mould was screaming about on those incredibly dense early Hüsker Dü records, but doesn't really give Quinn Goodwillie's generally excellent lyrics a fair chance.

Recording issues aside, this is obviously a very talented band, especially when you consider that most of the members are barely out of high school. For a first full-length release, On Time, Always is pretty darn impressive. It could have been a great CD, but it's not quite there yet. I've got my fingers crossed that Mt. St. Helens will cross that threshold their next time out.

(On Time, Always also contains a QuickTime video of tour footage.)