Vandelay Industries

Related Content

• Reader: Should Hewlett fire starter pay millions after Forest Service's North Fork mistake?
  May 24, 2012
• Reader: Dacono is so known as "Marijuana Town!"
  April 25, 2012
• Medical marijuana advocates collecting petitions to overturn Fort Collins ban
  April 25, 2012
• Pig-out at Fort Collins Brewery with Mark DeNittis
  April 17, 2012
• Reader: Fort Collins police shouldn't shove people, but their frustration is understandable
  March 28, 2012

More About

• Blake Hinson
• Fort Collins
• George Costanza
• Pop-Punk and Emo
• Arts, Entertainment, and Media

Like this Story?

Sign up for the Music Newsletter: Keep your thumb on the local music scene with music features, additional online music listings and show picks. We'll also send special ticket offers and music promotions available only to our Music Newsletter subscribers.

Privacy Policy Cancel Continue

Vandelay Industries — a Fort Collins pop-punk quartet awesomely named after George Costanza's fake business — makes no attempt at dressing up a well-worn genre with Critter. Instead, the band lets synths be pretty while drums, bass and guitar play safely within major-chord reason and Blake Hinson's voice stays completely unassuming. The sameness in songs like "Joliet" and "Synesthesia" could be to the group's detriment, but instead it comes across with the comforting coos of a lost Weezer or Anniversary B-side. The typical themes of wanton women, old-timey love and general young-dude stuff abound on Critter, but with a lyrical interest-keeping complexity: "Golden Sails & Crystal Anchors" has Hinson sweetly singing "So fold your seats the flattest to look something like a mattress/Act like you're not scared" to a fictional girl. That fictional girl might also be your little sister, and Vandelay Industries might be her favorite pop-punk band — but secretly, you love them, too.