Labels: Urinine
Review by: Andy Malcolm
This CD is a tribute to Journey. Like I am supposed to know what Journey sounded like right? I am some no-mark emo kid who would rather pick up old records by the Hated than old records by other bands. So I am listening to this more as if all the bands present on the record are making their own music I am afraid, so there you go. I like the cover though, it has retro cheesey sci-fi graphics featuring a space ship flying at a wire-frame vector graphics planet. Elite.
First band up is Ohms (who apparently are Shiner under a different name) and they play a rather neat and laid back indie rock track which has many fuzzy layers of piano, guitar, drums and it all comes together cohesively to produce a pretty good track called “Anytime”. I liked it. Next up we have Houston and they have guitar effects pedals. Then it turns into a rather overblown crunchy affair that is not so up my street. It even has some way dodgy metal riffs. Very iffy indeed. Then we have Wafflehouse* who are sort of mathy and have very whiney vocals. This is like an 1998 emo rock track. Maybe Journey inspired the whole genre of emo rock. I have no idea. This is catchy and melodic. It has a cool guitar solo on it and a bit where the song has a fake ending then comes back and the backing vocalists are all shouting. Ha ha, funny stuff. It actually has several fake endings, now I am laughing a lot. Last up is Traindodge, who are also playing 1998 mid-western emo rock, making me convinced that Journey inspired this genre. Catchy and melodic with big walls of guitars chugging away, whilst the vocals are strained and sung. This really rocks out with hidden screamy vocals in the background. Best track on here, I really enjoyed this. It has a really, really nice breakdown then it comes back and rocks some more. I’d like to hear more by this band if all their stuff sounds like this. It’s like Boys Life gone a bit more straight forward or something. Top notch.
Well, if you listen to emo rock then you should get this and then go and get Journey records as they obviously invented this genre! Hurry up!