The Bullet Parade is not a typical State College band. Let's face it, this just isn't the sort of the town that embraces lo-fi indie rock.

"If you succeed in State College, you must be doing something wrong," said Jeff Van Fossan, lead singer for the Bullet Parade. "Typically the kind of original music that gets big in State College is least common denominator stuff."

The perfect example of State College's indifference to underground original rock music was last year's Movin' On, according to Van Fossan.

"People were just leaving the Wilco show. If they had gotten Jewel, three times as many people would have been there."

Van Fossan said the problem arises with lack of exposure. He said the majority of people at Penn State aren't exposed to a lot of niched type music, something that has ironically become called "college rock."

"Music is just a soundtrack to drinking," Van Fossan said. "It's the jukebox bands that make it big in State College."

But Van Fossan hasn't let his frustration get to him. In fact, he still believes this town will one day embrace the music he likes.

"The reason I'm still here is it might turn into an Athens, Georgia." Many of the bands Van Fossan and the other members of the Bullet Parade idolize, such as R.E.M., came from Athens, a small college town in the middle of nowhere.

"Eventually someone will start a movement to create a reason for people to stay here," Van Fossan said.

He is already seeing it happen with the weekly indie rock event at The Darkhorse Tavern, 128 E. College Ave., called Roustabout!, which Van Fossan created himself.

The Bullet Parade is almost always one of the bands featured at Wednesdays' Roustabout!, but not because Van Fossan wants to force exposure of his band.

"Roustabout! is about helping to support a scene," Van Fossan said. "Bullet Parade is more for me. But I think we can be an intricate member of a burgeoning scene."

The Bullet Parade's sound draws heavily from '60s British bands like The Beatles, The Kinks, The Who, and The Rolling Stones to The Smiths in the '80s and the '90s Brit-pop explosion.

The only band member sharing a true different taste in music is drummer, John Ravert.

"John comes from a punk-emo sound," Van Fossan said. "He gives us a kick-in-the-ass beat."

Music theory grad and multi-instrumentalist Charles Ramsey describes his band's sound as "lo-fi psychedelic space rock with protest lyrics."

"We encompass the whole spectrum," said Ramsey, who covers more of the conservative side, while Van Fossan is the liberal voice.

"Our lyrics are a reflection of what's occurring in current society," Van Fossan said. "People don't feel comfortable."

The song "Radio Envy" is about the Voice of America radio station.

"It gets sent out from the states to every country in the world and promotes administrative policies," Van Fossan said.

It's that sort of mentality that bothers the Bullet Parade the most.

"There's tons of great music not on the music media machine," Ravert said. "Do something different for a change."