Labels: Something New Records – Struggletown – View From the Attic
Review by: MH
This is the first vinyl release by The Winter Passing. I liked their demo that they sent in last year and also got to see them play to about 15 people during a trip to Ireland as they were playing in Dublin while we were over there. I was lucky to make it to that gig after a precarious boat ride to the Skelligs in the Atlantic Ocean the day before on some clapped-out boat driven by a raving lunatic who used one hand to smoke a cigarette and the other to chat on his mobile phone with no thought for the steering wheel. There was nothing to hold on to but I managed to find muscles in both my feet and hands that I never knew existed to clamp myself tightly to the deck while the boat battered its way through waves the size of houses. We somehow didn’t drown and made it back to dry land to see these Tipperary guys play the next night.
I thought the song “Crooks” off that first demo was a cracking pop song and it makes a return with a slightly bigger sound here but minus the sample from “The Sandlot” film which kicked off that demo. “Feels Like Yesterday” also re-appears, although it has lost the word “Yesterday” from the title and has a sad, sung part added to the start. It works well. As for the two brand new songs, opener “1990” is mid-paced and typically melodic and poppy. They also throw in some “woah-woahs” for the first time – to my knowledge anyway. The other new track is a kind of prequel to “Gold Blend Part 2” that appeared on their split with Forrest last year.
I certainly have a soft spot for this band – I like the boy/girl vocals on here, I like the personal, introspective and downbeat lyrics and I like the melodies. The Winter Passing remind me of both The Get Up Kids (particularly lyrically) and Tigers Jaw. I may well have said something similar when I reviewed the demo but with 2 of those songs reappearing I am saying it again. By the sounds of it, this is getting some quite smart packaging with the record but according to Twitter they will probably all be gone by the time this review goes up.