Format, The - Dog Problems - Milky Clear Color Vinyl

The Format got dropped on purpose. Atlantic wanted a hit and kept saying so, so Nate Ruess and Sam Means wrote "The Compromise" — catchy as requested, and pointedly about the label requesting it. Atlantic let them go in late 2005. Those same rejected demos became Dog Problems, released in July 2006 on The Vanity Label, the imprint the duo founded to put it out themselves.

Freedom suited them. Produced by Steven McDonald of Redd Kross across two months of twelve-hour days in Los Angeles, it is the most ambitious thing either has written: Jellyfish's Roger Manning Jr. scoring strings and horns, playing Wurlitzer on "Time Bomb" and harpsichord on "Snails"; a young Josh Klinghoffer on guitar before the Chili Peppers; a gang of friends billed as the Hobocamp Choir shouting through "Oceans." Cello, tuba, clarinet and trombone, all in service of songs about one breakup.

It was The Format's second and final album, and the one that pointed straight at fun. Pressed on milky clear vinyl across two LPs, with the fourth side etched.

Disc 1, Side A
1. Matches
2. I'm Actual
3. Time Bomb
4. She Doesn't Get It

Disc 1, Side B
1. Pick Me Up
2. Dog Problems
3. Oceans
4. Dead End

Disc 2, Side A
1. Snails
2. The Compromise
3. Inches and Falling
4. If Work Permits

Disc 2, Side B — etched, no tracks.