Something Corporate

There are a lot of spiky-coiffed wonderteens vying to be king of the TRL mountain right now, but Something Corporate has the postmodern-boy-band blueprint down cold: an emo-tive pianist and frontman who knows that teen angst doesn’t call for bad-hair days, cuddly regular dudes who just want to play guitar and read Sylvia Plath, and a rhythm-section member with a goofy one-word name (bassist Clutch). The SoCal quintet has a bona fide sensation on its hands with its catchier-than-poison-oak single “Punk Rock Princess.” Heck, these beach boys even have good attitudes, signing every autograph with a smile and playing all-ages shows. Better yet, the group’s growing collection of irresistible valentines (“I Want to Save You”) and cinematic ballads (“Konstantine”) indicates that these suburban noisemakers have substance beneath the slick surface.