Bless their hearts—sometimes that’s the only reaction you can have when you come across a record that doesn’t quite make the grade. Such is the case with the third album by Brooklyn duo Cinema Cinema, A Night at the Fights (Lumiere). Everything looks good on paper: extensive touring—some with Black Flag—leading up to the release and production on the record by Martin Bisi. Sadly, the result is less than one might hope.

It’s a shame because it’s one thing to be inept and put out a record, and it’s another to seem know what you’re doing and still come up short. The record is too consistent for it to be something that just kind of fell together. The problem is that it’s just not very good. There’s a type of low-grade awfulness that blankets everything on the record. It starts with the vocals, which are yelped and unhinged at every moment, giving the songs nowhere to really go. They sit strangely high in the mix, demanding extra attention. And when they do grab your attention, you notice the sophomoric nature of the lyrics. When vocalist Ev Gold screams out, “You hate me now! You hate me now!” on “Boxcutter,” there may be a resulting headache from all of the eye rolling. Such songs have the emotional depth and lyrical dexterity of a pile of Creed outtakes. But you have to hand it to Gold, he goes for it at every moment. However, the defiant poses he strikes feel like that of a toddler in an adult suit. You see what he’s going for and you know what it’s supposed to look like, but he just doesn’t nail it.

Musically, the band is competent but uninspiring. There are some interesting bits, but they’re buried under the meh-ness of everything. Ironically, the production hand of Bisi only highlights the weaknesses. There’s a fair amount of studio trickery and “studio as instrument,” so it feels awkward when the production work is added to an album that probably doesn’t deserve it. When things are stripped down to just guitar and drums, it feels like there’s something there, but sadly that feeling is quickly dashed away. The record is also hampered by several cuts breaking the seven-minute mark. The band isn’t built for such grandiosity, and the songs for sure aren’t built for that type of workout. Basically, Cinema Cinema is your friend’s boyfriend’s band that are the second act on a Tuesday night, four-band bill. You may feign polite enthusiasm, but really you just want to drink your overpriced domestic beer and go home. Simply put, A Night at the Fights is a bad night out.