Superhuman

On its debut album Superhuman, Baltimore-based Cinder Road sounds like the best rough-and-ready New Jersey bar band you'll never experience. What's captured here is energetic classic-style rock, none of it mucked up by a tendency to get all experimental. More than anything, it's the sound of five guys working hard to get a powered-up and pretty raucous sound out; as the track list wears on, you can practically see sweat droplets winging off the long hair of frontman Mike Ruocco. DAUGHTRY, who the band opened for in front of this disc's release, is clearly a forefather. Highlights on a record full of likable hard-chargers and banged up ballads include first single "Get in Get Out" and "Should've Known Better," a familiar-sounding lament that takes its cues from the pre-emo old school.