Labels: Phyte
Review by: Andy Malcolm
Gosh, that band Alfonsin. Amazing! Eh? No, don’t buy this record because you once heard a band called Alfonsin. There are no former members of any such band here. Instead, this is a bunch of kids playing postive, straight edge, wait for it… emo-core! Way! That’s a new one. Screw that emo-core word by the way, no-one knows how to use it right. I’ve seen it crop up in describing bands as divergent as Far and the Get Up Kids. Wrong. Use emo-core in it’s correct sense, i.e. a band with large elements of both emo and hardcore. But are not predominantly one or the other of those. And not pop music. Pop music is not emo-core. Check it!
Enough rambling and idiocy, what the heck do the Formers sound like? Well, a pretty cool band! Throw in some pretty straight forward, but fast, melodic hardcore, and give them a wailing shouty singer to add to the punch. I’d say mix up some Kid Dynamite with the particularly obscure Roosevelts Inaugural Parade (how the heck that cool band spawned such pathetic children like King For A Day, I’ll never know), throw in the vocals of a band like Current or Native Nod even, and you are on the way to their sound. Just quick, tuneful, toe tapping, and those desperate emo styled vocals over the top. I like this more than the new Kid Dynamite, that’s for sure. Oh, and I wasn’t lying about the postive straight edge. You’d better believe it! Opening track “The Heckler” features the lyrics “We’re gonna bring it back!” and gang back up vocals, and it is a song about bands being able to voice their opinion at shows. And the final song, “XXX”, is about what the edge means to them “Straight edge, it’s more than in my heart, it’s in my hands”. I have about as much edge as a sphere, but this band is intelligent with this stuff without coming off as trite and annoying. This band has passion and isn’t afraid to show it. That wins me over every time. “Praxis” is my favourite track, the vocals are yelped out, they do some great talky bits, and the riffs are super catchy. Spectacular.
Project Hate isn’t really my thing, I think they feature former members of Spitboy. Despite starting off with a cool noodly emo-ey intro to the first song, they are soon playing pretty basic, shouty, political hardcore. And woah do this band shout good! It starts off on the right foot for me, totally. the first song “Project Hate” is rather cool indeed. After that, I start to lose interest as the guitars tend to chug in the same tone for much of the time. A bit more variation, and this would have worked well in my mind. Lyrics have something to say, which was good to read.
Two different sounding bands, but there is a fair chance you will like both of them if you approach it from the hardcore angle. Coming in at it from the emo side, Project Hate might catch you out. Then again, you might like them. They split up now. I presume FMoA is still alive. I hope so anyway.