For these rising emo heroes, the love is all around

February 07, 2006|Music Review, Marc Hirsh, Globe Correspondent

As one of the opening acts for the All-American Rejects, aspiring emo heartthrobs The Academy Is . . . got an intense fan reaction when it was in town in November. The band's return to Avalon on Saturday put its drawing power to the test, but the sold-out all-ages show proved that local fans still had more adoring to do.

Taking the stage as Europe's ''The Final Countdown" blasted over the P.A. system, The Academy Is . . . quickly reestablished its connection with the crowd, which throbbed as one, arms in the air, during ''Classifieds." William Beckett's whip-thin frame and long hair could have been lifted out of a 1970s rock-star handbook, but the singer declined to hold himself above the audience, at one point announcing: ''This place belongs to you. Don't ever forget that. We never will."

Such populism is lifted from yet another handbook: the tome of emo. But the band earns its adulation. As Beckett marched back and forth across the stage singing in his untrained boy-band tenor, the rest of the group unfurled glistening songs such as ''Down and Out" and ''The Phrase That Pays." Still, even though the band trotted out two new songs (one of which, ''Pour Yourself a Drink," seemed like a scrap), it exhausted its set list at the 45-minute mark.

Panic! At The Disco mined the same combination of melodicism and power but added a layer of agreeable bombast. It showed nervy energy with ''The Only Difference Between Martyrdom and Suicide Is Press Coverage." On ''Lying Is the Most Fun a Girl Can Have Without Taking Her Clothes Off," sinuous verses gave way to a hyperactive chorus. The band gave little indication that it hadn't played a single show until after its album ''A Fever You Can't Sweat Out" was recorded.

Hellogoodbye played an agreeably spry form of nerd-rock that had touches of New Wave.