Last month, the Minneapolis garage rock group, Frankie Teardrop called it quits with the release of their final album and a string of live shows. The album Hell Yep, released in May, puts an end to the band‰’s three-year career playing mostly in the Twin Cities and Upper Midwest region. Now, you may be wondering, “why do I care about some no-name Minneapolis band‰’s last album?‰” My only answer is that the album is a seriously good summer album. I‰’ll be the first one to pshaw about “summer albums‰” and jams, but there is something to be said for music that I find when I‰’m not worried about class and music that I don‰’t have to listen to while doing homework. Carefree listening is certainly something that Hell Yep offers. But the skillful blend of slacker music and serious musicianship underscores how sad it is that Frankie Teardrop has disintegrated.

The album starts off with the jangly and catchy “Not a Love Song‰Û. The track lends more to the band‰’s shoegaze influences than garage. Ringing guitar chords layer over frantic and robotic drumming. The centerpiece of the album is the four minute long “Back to it‰Û, clocking in at about twice the length of most of the other songs. “Back to It‰” brings a surprisingly serious mood shift to the album. Each lyric line in the verse starts with “Picture me,‰” and the singer inserts some activity. Apart from instigating head nodding, the lyrics really capture the universal “what might have been‰” feeling we have when we say goodbye to people. Then there‰’s the under-a-minute tracks: “It Flipped‰” and “Convertible/Cig Death.” I wonder why the band bothered to record either of them while simultaneously find myself humming along.

If there was one song to listen to first, it would be either the aforementioned “Not a Love Song‰” or the light-hearted “Beauty Station.” “Beauty Station‰” is a song about how it is useless to socialize and look good which is why the singer doesn‰’t try. The song serves as a perfect example of Frankie Teardrop‰’s ability use a humorous or stupid song topic but make it a great song by writing the music really well. In this case, the band wrote an absolute butter guitar riff. “Beauty Station” also has my favorite lyric on the album: “A lot of people like to go out and socialize but don‰’t realize that it‰’s totally meaningless. What are you creating when you‰’re at a party? Nothing!‰” The last song, “Waitin For You‰” closes off the album nicely as it nods its head to the band‰’s more poppy influences.

The innocuous lyrics and tongue-in-cheek short songs do well to mask but not detract from the serious maturity of songwriting. In the band‰’s own words, “this album is as far as this band needs to go and what this band should sound like‰Û. The album is available to download at “name your price‰” on Bandcamp:

RIYL: The Orwells, Audacity, King Tuff, FIDLAR ,

Recommended Tracks: 1,2,6,8,12