Review Column for Music Monthly Magazine

These are samples for a monthly column of independent album reviews for Music Monthly Magazine.

Every Time I Die – “Gutter Phenomenon”

In a word, relentless. Start to finish, Every Time I Die’s latest effort, “Gutter Phenomenon” drives with intention and invention. While the necessary components are present for a common hardcore album…the majority of vocals toneless, overdriven, rhythmic spasms; the occasional blast beat; the abundance of dissonance…to call it so would be a discredit to the band and the engineer, for it is so much more. While the guitar style is choppy, aggressive and biting, the tones and scales are more akin to the warmth of dirt rock than hardcore, making the harmonic content as interesting as the rhythmic. The highlight of this oddity comes during “The New Black”, when vocalist Keith Buckley demonstrates his ability not only to keep pace with any hardcore frontman, but also to successfully navigate melodically around obscure and ironic guitar chromatics, which subsequently manage to stay perfectly in step with flailing, abrupt time changes…all of which somehow sounds natural in its own masochistic way. Certainly the best part about this album is how esoteric it is throughout, yet how straight rock and roll it feels. Live, dirty guitars with cheap stomp boxes, big drums that are hit hard, analogue-sounding vocal overdrive…its almost as if “Gutter Phenomenon” is a sort of reinterpretation of rock for this generation, erasing all boundaries, limitations and expectations that its contributing genres may want to impose.

Mismo – “…and to the Republic”

Ideologically, a band after my own heart. Brethren of sarcasm and satire, apparent from their coversheet bio to the lyrical content of “…and to the Republic”. A band who aptly name influences from Fugazi to The Mars Volta, open their new album with a wake-up distorto scream that somehow sounds neither forced nor gratuitous. The album quickly recedes dynamically and their melodic sensibilities prove that Mismo is much more than a novelty-noise act. There is a sort of basement-recording vibe to it all though that’s simultaneously its weakest trait and greatest attribute. Often times, the vocals slip a bit from key or a guitar may not sync with the drums. A sloppy kick hit here, or a bass note pulled sharp. But rather than sounding sloppy or unrehearsed, it sounds spontaneous and true. Erratic. Edgy and provoked, yet mature and refined. The sort of sound, for instance, that any of us working adults would naturally be compelled to want to make at the end of nine consecutive hours stuck in a cubicle in early May, working towards a modest paycheck which, after taxes, will barely cover our monthly payment on a monumental debt consolidation loan. You can feel the authentic punk rock roots in the foundation of every brash note, yet the music itself supersedes genre. It manages to be loud and angsty without placating to any audience including the old-school punks, and in that it proves its validity. On the contrary, despite my predilection for the raw way in which it was recorded, the album suffers its share of production and performance shortcomings. I can’t help but wonder how much “..and to the Republic” would’ve benefited from a knuckle-rapping veteran producer behind the board.

Product

One can not help but be afraid of the album artwork for the new Product CD…a negative image of a barcode with the word Product superimposed underneath. Is it a trite jab at commercial radio or an appeal to it? Thankfully, neither extreme is overtly apparent in the music contained within. True, there is certainly no reinvention of the wheel here, however there is no stark emulation to any other commercial band either. As it ought to be, the band is unapologetically making the music that they want to make, and I applaud them for that. Driving, steady power drums in four. Riff based guitars with a tone that’s controlled but is still behind the line of sounding processed. Strong melodic vocals with appropriate harmonies. This is a straight up modern rock cd. To its credit, the production and performance are both excellent by all accounts; however the problem that I continue to return to as I listen to the disc is the songs’ tendency to blend into one another. Standing alone, any one of these songs could be a Product single. Together, it sounded as just that…a collection of singles rather than an album. Each with an almost too similar structure, tempo, feel, progression, and execution. Towards the end of the disc, during and after the bridge of the song “Further”, they finally begin to peek out of the box to explore vocally, and it’s a suitable climax to the short cd. The strict tonal focus maintained for the rest of the album is abandoned with relish, and instead emerges beautiful, careless, open, and vulnerable vocals dancing around playful snare drum hits. The subtle changeup is what makes a song that starts as one of the most pop-rock-friendly on the album into the most interesting. It shows the greater artistic potential possessed by this band that may only feel lacking because of the brevity of the cd.

East is East

Strong songwriting, served bittersweet. Like the battered, smiling doll which the band found in the gutter at Mardi Gras that serves both as a sort of high concept for their music and as the artwork for the album “Better Days”, the highlights of this album are those moments when the band manages to fuse frustration and futility with a subtle sense of hope. The opening track, “Gravity”, does this quite well. Unique yet familiar. It teeters towards bubble-gum rock and may be off-putting as such if not for that tang of sour morose, and that small chip of gloom is the album’s greatest characteristic. If in fact that was the intent, by the third track the album has established its voice perfectly. Saturated, drawing guitars playing open chords and slow-to-resolve leads underneath darker vocal harmonies bring about a strange nostalgia that is absolutely beautiful. However, the album downshifts quite quickly, and too quickly for my taste. The song that follows is “Mary’s Gone”, a predictable pop ballad that, although is technically well performed with added guest vocalist Meg Murray singing her part of the saccharinated duet, starts to push the album in a much different direction. The strong alchemy of the opening tracks begins to break down into its notable components. The fusion begins to sound a bit forced, and as a result the unique vibe starts to sound more and more common. Unfortunately, by the last track, the album has morphed into repetitive pop ballads. If critiquing this as a full album, it seems that East is East created the most beauty on “Better Days” in all the places that they weren’t intentionally going. Like their album artwork, if not for the smile despite its worn condition in the gutter and the metaphor that implies, it’s just a lifeless, smiling doll.