Sick Puppies

This band is known for two things: rawk and hugs. The second claim to fame comes from their YouTube video featuring a dude who hands out free hugs. The first comes from the rawk. Both facets are here on the band's second album: "All the Same," the ode to unconditional love from the hugs video, is poignant enough to make us tear up (SO?), while "Cancer" tends, unsurprisingly, more toward the nu-metal-y, shredding end of the spectrum. And of course, there's plenty of that tried-and-true post-grunge technique of starting soft and sweet, then snowballing into the harder stuff. Rawk! And hugs!