COMPANY 

Dear America

exitstencil.org/company.php

This Charleston quintet’s excellent sophomore album is all about emotional highs and lows. Opener “Moonlight” is the Young Rascals’ “Good Lovin’” done in the rousing arena-Americana style of My Morning Jacket, and the vibe stays as lively on “Show Me You Really Want Me,” a Weezer-grade ’90s-rock basher. By “Bound to Drop the Ball,” however, singer Brian Hannon has dug out his harmonica and started apologizing for “causing so much wrong.” Dear America is also a record about our conflicted country, which Hannon both celebrates and chastises on the title cut. “Do you really think we were waiting for the walls to come tumbling down?” he asks, sounding rather afraid that he already knows the answer.