Sick Puppies
Dressed Up As Life
Virgin Records; April 2007
The Sick Puppies, hailing from Sydney, graced the stage of the Santa Barbara Bowl on Sunday in the coveted opening slot for Evanescence. Their “fame” can be mostly attributed to a humanitarian-themed music video for their single “All The Same”which has garnered 11 million YouTube hitsand subsequent appearances on Oprah and the Tonight Show with Jay Leno. Still, to fully appreciate these Puppies’ music, one must travel by Delorean back to a simpler time of Nickelback and Creed, when, somehow, it wasn’t embarrassing to pen heartfelt n¼ metal ballads. The band’s debut full-length, Dressed Up As Life, is a mixture of radio-ready cuts like “My World”teeming with predictable pauses and tired, emotional versesand up-tempo tracks la Coheed and Cambria that combine metal-head riffs with hardcore breakdowns.
