I see a lot of these punked and emoed up 80s song covers as a tool of marketing crossover appeal for us Generation Xers and the Y set. Yet whenever my friends and I hear those bastardized songs we roll our eyes, not so much for the poor renditions but the idea that they couldn't come up with something original.

Um, he's from upper Michigan actually, and from an interview with Dusted Features he says he has very limited personal experience from Illinois, but I'll grant you he did do extensive research of the state with history books.

PRETENTIOUS….VOUS?
I was anxious to get Sufferyan's work when I heard he was doing Illinoise, since I'm from that great state myself (the lower half, not the north of I-80 half). The album has a few good tunes, but it's dripping with pretentiousness, and after I learned he composed and wrote most of it in NYC, putting…