Dust off your hair metal wigs and Whitesnake T-shirt – Ultimate Fakebook has finally released their follow-up to 1998’s “This Will be Laughing Week.”

The Initial Records debut is a long-awaited 12 new songs packed with geek rock goodness and pure rock ‘n’ roll perfection.

The tongue-in-cheek title, “Open Up and Say Awesome,” is modeled after hair metal party band Poison’s 1988 release, “Open Up and say . Ahh!”

The title is only a sample of the witty ways of UFB, who claim to be the second coming of rock ‘n’ roll minus the mullets.

With this album, it may be true.

This time around, they’ve adapted the high school yearbook geek persona into a slightly more mature, but still all- about-partying attitude. What is obvious on this release, however, is that Bill McShane is in love.

In “Forever, Forever,” McShane presents an ode to overcoming fears and yielding to love.

“Forever/ So weird at first, but now I’m sure/ I’ll surrender . Forever/ And whatever it is you want me to do/ I’ll do it, Oh yeah.”

“Goddamn Dance Craze” is a carefree track with kicky drum beats about letting go and succumbing to the rock.

“I feel like the Beatles rollin’ into town/ So hungry that I’m still not fazed that you’re not screamin’.”

“Open Up and Say Awesome” is more than enough reason to succumb to the rockin’, rousing ways of UFB.

– Erin Randolph

Ah, Canada, our neighbors to the north.

Canada has been responsible for producing some noteworthy products over the years: hockey, maple syrup, Mounties, Rush, Terrence and Phillip, Alanis Morrisette and draft dodging.

Then there are the not-so-noteworthy Canadian exports: Bryan Adams, Celine Dion and now Simple Plan.

“No Pads, No Helmets. Just Balls,” Simple Plan’s debut album on Atlantic Records, is 12 tracks of banal, annoying and derivative pop-punk. Without the punk, or for that matter, decent pop styling.

This album is tedious right from the start; it seems as if three or four songs have gone by, when barely two minutes of the first song have elapsed.

Nothing can save this record. Not even backing vocals by the torch-bearers of the pop-punk genre, namely Mark Hoppus of Blink-182 who appears on “I’d Do Anything.”

At least Simple Plan will have company in the special spot in hell for those who make music this bad. Joel Madden and the other members of Good Charlotte will keep good company after guesting on “You Don’t Mean Anything.”

Pierre Bouvier, lead vocalist, presumably the one to be held legally responsible for these horrible lyrics, even rips off himself. It’s only two more songs before he’s copping the “worst day ever” line from the song of the same name.

Apparently his nights suck, too. On “I’m Just a Kid,” Bouvier recalls his nights spent alone because he has no friends and “no one cares `cuz I’m alone and the world is having more fun than me.”

And when you thought it couldn’t get worse, Simple Plan makes you regret you ever opened your mouth.

The song “My Alien” talks of a subject people all over the world are sure to identify with: intergalactic dating. Apparently Bouvier has been scoring in another solar system.

“She has two arms to hold me and four legs to wrap around me. She’s not your typical girlfriend.”

Simple Plan sums it all up nicely in the song, “God Must Hate Me.” Well, that may or may not be true, but just we’ll have to wait till he hears this record.

– Jesse Stensby