In pop music today, with its recyclable tunes and less-than-credible stars (Ashlee Simpson� Need I say more?), �genuine� is a word not often thrown into the ring when describing the genre. But somehow a few artists manage to transcend the MySpace-and tabloid-ridden world of pop that often distracts listeners. With the release of their third album, Goodbye Blues, Chicago quartet The Hush Sound proves to be a group that rises above pop music�s low standards.

Shortly after signing with Pete Wentz�s vanity label Decaydance Records in 2005, The Hush Sound released Like Vines, a warm pop album that � despite little airplay and promotion � received critical praise as well as relative commercial success. The only problem was that Like Vines deviated from the more lo-fi, Fleetwood Mac sound the band employed on their first release, So Sudden, in favor of a more polished pop-punk sound.

In a recent interview with The Badger Herald, The Hush Sound�s lead vocalist and guitarist, Bob Morris, attributed this to the production.

�With Like Vines, we still had never gone on tour, and we kind of just let Sean [O� Keefe] record our songs in the way he wanted to record them.�

But with Goodbye Blues, the band took a different approach � and seemingly the correct one. After a short search, they concluded there was only one man to produce their next album, and The Hush Sound passed the reins to Kevin Augunas.

�[Augunas] just recorded the Cold War Kids� album Robbers & Cowards, and we were really into the way that sounded,� Morris said. �We wanted [Goodbye Blues] to sound raw and awesome like that.�

Perhaps the best testimonial to this claim can be heard on the pre-released track �Medicine Man� on the band�s MySpace page.

But loyal fans of Like Vines should not be too worried that this album will be a complete divergence from the �hush-sound.� Greta Salpeter�s blossoming voice still graces 10 of the album�s 13 songs, with the album�s first single, �Honey,� being no exception. And the swinging rock rhythms that made songs like �Wine Red� and �Crawling Towards the Sun� dark-horse favorites are still intact. The band has even continued the unofficial tradition of offering a pop-hero cameo, only this time Patrick Stump has given way to the pop-producer-extraordinaire Butch Walker.

Goodbye Blues appears to have all the makings of a successful, musically respectable album, but unfortunately and perhaps unfairly, The Hush Sound are frequently lumped into the same category as pop-punk acts who draw more commercial success from style rather than substance (Panic at the Disco, Fall Out Boy and the All-American Rejects). If this is the case, one must wonder if anyone with a driver�s license will ever take them seriously and be able to look past this unwarranted association. 

�I think it�s a misconception that we are specifically trying to only target a certain audience,� Morris said. �What we really want to do is just affect anyone who is listening to music. We have our own aspirations to reach a lot more people than [those] who just like Fall Out Boy.�