After bumbling around the St. Louis scene for years, Ludo has finally begun proving itself as a little band that could. Last year, thanks to legions of online voters, the regional rockers played a coveted showcase at Austin's South by Southwest Music Festival and were hailed by Fuse TV as a "next big thing." What's attracted the devotion of teenage geeks is the band's cerebral, hum-along sensibility, like Weezer without the creepy edge of Rivers Cuomo. When it comes to underdogs, Ludo's stumpy frontman, Andrew Volpe, is the self-deprecating kind you can't help but root for. He's lovable in the same way as the lumbering Labyrinth character his band is named for, but not so beastly dumb. Volpe's snarky accounts of romantic ineptitude are rife with pop-culture references ("Good Will Hunting By Myself," "Ode to Kevin Arnold") and, unlike so much bleeding-heart emo punk, rarely delivered in earnest.
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