5 Cent Deposit's third album's worth of Hot Topic-ready mall-punk,
Focus on the Negative follows the post-
Green Day blueprint of catchy three-minute pop songs with buzzsaw guitars and shout-along choruses, blended with just enough teen angst in the lyrics to potentially hook some
Dashboard Confessional fans. The results are not quite as schematic as that précis makes it sound, and there are a few nifty blasts of punk-pop here, like "11729" (the zip code of Deer Park, NY, in the band's Long Island stomping grounds) and the optimistic snarl of the opening "Still Standin'." However, there are also a couple of real groaners, foremost among them being the flatly terrible closer "Hey Me" (which sounds like a depressingly non-ironic attempt at a
Styx-style power ballad, complete with plodding piano) and far too many uninspired, by-the-book efforts in the
Good Charlotte vein. Not negative, perhaps, but frustratingly mediocre. ~ Stewart Mason