162. Song No. 2,414: “A Decade Under the Influence,” Taking Back Sunday
Where You Want to Be, 2004

I think I initially liked this localish band because it seemed like everyone else around me did and it was just easier to sing along and enjoy the stuff that was incessantly playing no matter what company I was keeping because early-aughts TBS easily transcended every single friend group’s boundaries. Tell All Your Friends was fuckin omnipresent (and, for a good portion of freshman year’s fall semester, it was also the only album my beloved five-disc CD player would recognize in its final weeks, but the less we say about that year’s roommate and how my poor dorm room stereo took the snowball intended for her, the better) and I did form a genuine though late-blooming affinity for both TBS and their debut album.

The follow-up, Where You Want to Be, was….fine. The problem was really my own: I think my tastes had become firmly planted in indie rock’s more muted moods and less raucous sound by the time this sophomore album came out and my brief but eventually authentic love for Taking Back Sunday had moved on, taking my time as their intended audience with it. This is one of those albums I bought more out of obligation than because I was prowling the record stores’ shelves eagerly awaiting its release. Its predecessor is chock full of instantly recognizably song titles that still do things to my heart—”Cute Without the ‘E’!” “Timberwolves at New Jersey!” And especially, feverishly and obsessively, “Great Romances of the 20th Century!”—while this album is filled with absolutely alien track names. Three days ago, I wouldn’t’ve been able to either name or identify a single song on this album.

But I sure as hell will forever know this song the second I hear it. It sounds like Bamboozle and Skurf and local shows and summer concerts and one-night festivals and summer nights with the windows down and volume up and everyone, whether it’s inside a friend’s too-packed car or as just one person in a massively undulating crowd, is singing along as loudly and earnestly and as a single screaming voice as they possibly can.