Jimmy Eat World

Sporting a dry, sunny crackle that befits their home base of Mesa, Arizona, Jimmy Eat
World's "The Middle" is a great summer rock song that actually sounds like summer. Guitars
click at a rapid clip; drums are punchy, actually danceable, not merely mosh-worthy. Jim
Adkins' tenor delivers a hopeful message to a fallen friend, tension mounts, the chorus
hesitates for a split second of silence and then pow! The track explodes into a p... More >

Jimmy Eat World are who Blink-182 want to be when they grow up--even played B-182 frontman Tom DeLonge's wedding. Since JEW frontman Jim Adkins specializes in sensitive leaps and catches, this bodes well for DeLonge's visits to the marriage counselor, but it'll ruin his whine. Like most emo bands only at a higher level of tunecraft, JEW are so surprised to discover that punks become adults that they're impressed by feelings even a folksinger would know were banal. Their label hopes that pop fans won't care--that if this band can't be maturity's answer to 'N Sync, it can be patriotism's answer to Travis. (Grade: C+)