I first listened to this tape a couple of weeks back on the way to work, and fell in love. Being a demo it has the roughest of rough ‘production’, it’s just a bunch of dudes in a laundry room pouring their hearts out into a three gorgeous slices of emo. First thing that struck me was that they tend to have several vocalists hollering and yelling all at once which is super effective. The first song breaks in with a moody intro, guitars swirling and the big warm bass sound hovering around. To people unfamiliar with the style they’d probably be a bit baffled as there appears to be so many layers to the sound and so much going on but any emo kid worth their salt should be able to pick apart the strands and appreciate it. The opener has a super sweet breakdown into something very reminiscent of Evergreen at their twinkly best, the spoken vocals get buried amidst everything going then it suddenly bounces back into a jazzy ending that I find absolutely killer. When everything drops away to just a couple of guitars and the bass then I go weak at the knees. The second track starts off with this great and deliberate build up before it hurtles in at the deep end to another mess of crying and instrumentation, hitting the hottest of grooves and lurching around the room. They pack in some more twinkling loveliness for good measure, and the bouncy drive to the finish is sexy too. The third track sways into action with such a rhythmical mish-mash of guitar and bass that I practically fall out of my seat in delirium, it’s so good. Too many neat touches and perfect parts sprinkled together in a chaotic fashion. Ludicrous. Although I didn’t like the ending to this one. Never mind.
Least fair comparison I will ever make: Evergreen + Cap’n Jazz + Embassy (or something). Sorry to the people in this band.
Well, if you don’t mind wading your way through the non-production and are a sucker for boys yelling and mashing their guitars into strange kinds of beauty you will be all over this. For reals. DIY emo forever! Personal / political lyrics too.