The Plastic Constellations first full-length call to arms,
Let's War, continues to preach the teenage idealists' gospel: hearts to be worn on sleeves, emotions to be expressed openly and freely without fear of ridicule, and rock music to danced to at full volume. They profess a healthy mistrust of hero worship and corporate hegemony, without sacrificing a shred of their sense of humor; to wit, the title track pits the band against "the serpent" (a manifestation of all the aforementioned evils of the world), who they mercilessly attack with their "long-ass swords." A freshly graduated batch of high school survivors when the album was recorded, they astutely made
Let's War a stylistically diverse affair, mixing hip-hop rhyme structures, heave-and-pitch vocal trade-offs, and bar-room piano balladry into their effervescent indie guitar anthems. Their righteous cause and irresistible humor are engendering, as is the Guru quip at the end of the album. But as they scream at the underground hipster contingent, the too-cool-for-school post-rockers, and the impeccably dressed to let down their guard and "come together for the love of God and have a good time!," an uneasy feeling inevitably worms its way into even the most devoted hearts, and gives way to one question: How long can the band continue to fight their post-modern battles before they're swallowed whole by the sucking vortex of adulthood? Fortunately, true believers in the tenets of the underground have always known that, so long as there are fired-up, guitar-toting youths, there will always be the Plastic Constellations. ~ Bryan Carroll