Don't you just love seeing bands who know what their best songs are? Going to an Appleseed Cast show is always awesome because these Lawrence lads play hit after hit after hit, from 1998 right up until 2006. It seems like at their shows I'm constantly whispering to my concert companion, "Oh, this is my favorite from Mare Vitalis" or "This is the best song on Low Level Owl Volume 1." They are the rare band that has enough really solid songs to last an entire set (take that, Pinback!).

Appleseed consistently amazes. Every year they just seem to get better. And with the recent release of their latest album, Peregrine, 2006 will further their rein of RULE.

The Appleseed Cast was once a band that used to play mediocre emo high on the guilty-pleasure tip (in their early days, you could just picture the singer tearing off his shirt in torment as he sang out pages from his tear-stained diary). I knew when I was listening to, and singing along to, their first album, End of the Ring Wars, that I shouldn't be into this stuff unless I was in Driver's Ed and toting a JanSport (I was in college and toting a JanSport).

Sure, I knew I "shouldn't" like it, but I did. After that first album, however, all guilt associated with The Appleseed Cast was laid to rest forever. They just became a better band. Subsequent releases document the band metamorphisis from Mineral to an experimental U2 (ok, not a great example to back up my "no guilt" claim... but damn it if the guitars don't sound JUST like The Edge's). This band must have realized at some point that straight-up emo was done, so instead of packing it in, they just decided to become more awesome.

I can say without a trace of hyberbole that The Appleseed Cast are one of the most underrated bands in indiedom today. And that ain't no joke.

Boom, for real.

The Appleseed Cast play North Six on Saturday, April 15th