The Get Up Kids – There Are Rules

“You’ve got the dirty bombs and I’ve got nothing to wash them with.” When an album opens with a line like that, it’s either going to be joyfully irreverent or painfully self-aware, but since this is the first album by The Get-Up Kids’ in seven years, it’s not quite so easy to define.

Good news first, this album contains everything that made TGUK such an infinitely likeable band in the first place, with a plethora of bittersweet singalong choruses as well as the odd curve-ball, like the synth-and-phaser heavy Automatic.

Not only that, but Matt Pryor’s vocals are as strong and distinctive as they ever were, such that it’s impossible to imagine anyone else bringing the same awkward charm to these songs. The only downside is that while There Are Rules is peppered and book-ended by their strong brand of proto emo-punk, it drags when they rely too heavily on moody atmospherics. Still, it’s worth it just to have them back. [David Bowes]