Review: "Hypnosis for Sleep" by Keep

            On its first release, Hypnosis for Sleep, the band Keep blends post-hardcore and shoegaze into thick, swirling tracks that simultaneously balance heaviness and ambiance. The group hails from Virginia, and notably contains Danny Dempsey of the excellent rising Virginia pop-punk outfit Turnover.

            Keep uses a dense, droning rhythm section to create a compelling sonic texture that falls somewhere in between Slowdive and Balance And Composure. The E-bow, an instrument that vibrates guitar strings using electromagnetic waves, can be heard throughout the EP, and so can melancholy lead guitar lines full of lazy hammer-ons and slides reminiscent of the early Smashing Pumpkins. Drifting lyrics are delivered by two different vocalists, and often in layered, two-part harmony.  Unlike many contemporaries who aim for a heavy yet ambient sound, Keep manages to strike a delicate balance between a static wall of sound and melodic clarity. Even when the music gets thick and muddy, the vocals and lead guitar never get bogged down in the mud.

            Hypnosis for Sleep is a very short EP. Its three tracks clock in at just under ten minutes, but it’s a very consistent and enjoyable ten minutes. This is definitely a group that fans of shoegaze and post-hardcore alike will want to keep a close eye on.

Score: 4/4

Hypnosis for Sleep is available on Keep's Bandcamp for $3.

Review: The Front Bottoms "Rose EP"

           

             New Jersey punks The Front Bottoms have exploded into popularity through their fast, witty songs about suburban life and high-energy live performances with wild props like giant inflatable snowmen. The band has spent the last year relentlessly touring both as a headlining act and as the opening act for big names such as Brand New and Manchester Orchestra.

            The group’s live shows typically draw from material off their two most recent albums, but the Front Bottoms have five full-lengths in all. Fan requests for older songs as well as the recent passing of drummer Mat Uychich’s grandmother prompted the release of the Rose EP. The EP is a tribute to Mat’s grandmother Rosemary, and the majority of its six tracks are new takes on old Front Bottoms’ material. Songs are drawn from the band’s first three LPs I Hate My Friends, My Grandma Vs. Pneumonia, and Brothers Can’t Be Friends. These three albums never saw commercial release, but they do circulate around the internet for free.

            The updated tracks on Rose at heart are the same classic Front Bottoms material, but add slicker production and new instrumentation. Originally, these songs were recorded with acoustic guitar, drums, and piano. The band has since added a bassist and an electric guitarist. Rose incorporates these new instruments into the old songs and the resulting sound is similar to their 2013 album Talon of the Hawk. Opening track “Flying Model Rockets,” for example, features lead electric guitar breaks, driving bass, and a cleaner, less lo-fi sound overall. “Flying Model Rockets” and several other tracks on the EP feel faster than the original versions, and this leads to the Rose EP’s main problem: the speed.

The speed of most tracks on this release is just frantic, and not in a good way. “Be Nice To Me” and “Lipstick Covered Magnet” in particular suffer as the Front Bottoms plow towards the end of the song like they have somewhere they would rather be. The band’s lyrics are typically sung in rapid-fire succession, and speeding these tracks up even more makes the music feel rushed and unfulfilling.

            That’s not to say Rose is a train wreck. “Jim Bogart” is a great update of the classic track that adds a melancholy trumpet line to vocalist Brian Sella’s refrain of “Sometimes things just don’t work out,” and the song is not rushed like many others on the EP.

The Front Bottoms' Brian Sella performing
 in Pensacola, Florida at The Handlebar.

Rose further redeems itself with the closer “Awkward Conversations.” The track is a brand new song, not too fast, and performed with just vocals and an acoustic guitar. Sella sings the vivid chorus of “I personally think its too cold to have the windows open / But you want to smoke your menthol cigarettes” over his signature thick power chords reminiscent of the band’s early albums. Ironically, the only new song on this EP sounds more like old Front Bottoms material than the updated old songs.

            A lot of fans will likely be unhappy with the Rose EP because these updated tracks fail to do the originals justice. It is more than just nostalgia for the past that keeps these tracks from greatness. This release was recorded with a different lineup than the song’s original conception, and they just do not translate as well to this new setup.

Quality aside, it’s great the band now has a way to make some money off these songs that were originally free. Hopefully this is a sign The Front Bottoms will be dipping into their back catalogue as they choose setlists for upcoming shows. These are still some great songs, but the Rose EP is just not the best available version of them.

            Score: 2/4

            The Rose EP is streaming now at Red Bull’s website. CD copies will be available from Bar/None Records on June 17th, and vinyl release is scheduled for August 16th.

Review: Tigers Jaw "Charmer"

The last few years have been a roller coaster for Scranton Pennsylvania punk outfit Tigers Jaw. Early 2013 saw the band announcing the departure of three founding members. Tours were canceled, rumors flew, and many thought Tigers Jaw was done for, but guitarist Ben Walsh and keyboardist Brianna Collins announced that they would continue Tigers Jaw without the other members. Departing members Adam McIlwee(guitar), Dennis Mishko(bass), and Pat Brier (drums) decided to remain in Tigers Jaw long enough to record one final album. That album is “Charmer,” and it is a record that divides itself between the band’s signature bouncy punk rock and some new stylistic surprises.

Over the course of the album, four different singers take lead vocal roles. This gives “Charmer” a more diverse feel than previous Tigers Jaw releases where guitarists Adam and Ben handled most of the singing. The album kicks off with “Cool,” a fast-paced track with a dense wall of guitar distortion, driving drums, and Adam McIlwee’s signature moaned vocals. McIlwee has a knack for forcing clever rhymes out of words and coaxing a lot of emotion out of short, basic lines. In the chorus of “Cool,” Adam casually shrugs off the unfairness of the life with the line “It’s a cruel world/But it’s cool.”

Brianna Collins takes over lead vocals for “Hum.” Collins has sung lead on a few non-album songs before, but “Hum” is her first lead track on a Tigers Jaw full length. The track builds anticipation with a near forty-second intro repeat of a simple guitar riff over and over. Guitarist Ben Walsh joins Collins on the chorus. The two sing of long-term anxiety after a relationship ends and compare the painful memories of someone to an ever-present white noise in chorus “You are the leaves at my feet/You are the hum of electric heat.”

The album's middle tracks depart from the classic Tigers Jaw style and push the band’s sound in new directions. The title track opens with a bass line that sounds like it was lifted from one of Jack White’s various classic-rock tinged bands. The song revolves around this intro bass line, and it is a nice change of pace for a band where songs are rarely bass centric.

“I Envy Your Apathy” is the biggest stylistic curve ball on the album. It opens with a dramatic western-tinged guitar chord while drummer Pat Brier supplies the lead vocals. This is Brier’s first vocal appearance on a Tigers Jaw track. His voice is grunge tinged and much lower than the band’s other singers. Imagine a soft-spoken Chris Cornell, airlifted out of the 90s, and dropped on the stage to do guest vocals. “I Envy Your Apathy” has a slower, less urgent pace than past Tigers Jaw material, and it is an interesting stylistic experiment for a band that rarely strays from their core sound.

The rest of the album is largely standard fare for the group, but in a good way. Highlights include “Distress Signal,” “Nervous Kids,” and “Slow Divide.” The group has always penned some of the more creative lyrics within the pop-punk scene, and “Charmer” is no exception.

The closing track is entitled “What Would You Do.” It’s a nearly six-minute slow burner, and also Tigers Jaw’s longest track to date. An infectious drum and bass groove drones for the track’s entirety while Brianna and Adam complement the rhythm with a robotic and unemotional, yet effective chorus of “What would you do?” over and over again. It is a great closing track and the best stylistic departure on the album.

“Charmer” could have easily been a bad album. Over half the band went into the recording process intending to leave after its completion, but the imminent division does not show through on a single track. On the contrary, “Charmer” finds Tigers Jaw tackling new styles, adding new vocalists, and crafting great songs as they’ve always done. “Charmer” is an excellent swan song for Tigers Jaw as we know it because it does not sound like a swan song at all. It’s a shame the group is losing several members just as their style branches out, but fans have been given a fantastic album to remember the band’s original lineup by while they anticipate where Ben and Brianna will take Tigers Jaw in the future.

Score: 4/4

“Charmer” is available on Bandcamp for $5. A CD/Vinyl release is scheduled for June 3^rd.

http://runforcoverrecords.bandcamp.com/album/charmer

Review: Chris Kerekes' "Weave Me The Sunshine"

Back in late January, brothers Chris and Mat Kerekes released their Winter Split EP. As a big fan of Mat’s solo work and his other band Citizen, the Winter Split was a much anticipated release for me. I was not too familiar with Chris’ work at the time, and so I looked forward to hearing the Mat tracks the most. Surprisingly though, Chris’ songs were the real highlight on Winter Split. His track “The Sidewalk” in particular was so catchy it had me sitting down with my guitar for a few hours trying to learn the song by ear.

Not even four months have passed since the Winter Split’s release, but Chris Kerekes has been very busy since then. On Tuesday he put out a five song EP entitled “Weave Me The Sunshine”.

“Weave Me The Sunshine” largely stays true to Chris’ past work. The songs are soft acoustic arrangements paired with Chris’ poetic introspections on various relationships. What sets “Weave Me The Sunshine” apart from Chris’ past efforts is this EP’s production.

 Mixing and mastering for “Weave Me The Sunshine” was handled by prominent New Wave punk producer Will Yip. Yip’s production credits include some of the biggest New Wave bands including Title Fight, Balance and Composure, Citizen, and one of 2014’s best albums so far, La Dispute’s “Rooms of the House.” Yip brings a lot of experience to the table and it reveals itself in the more polished sounds of “Weave Me The Sunshine.”

“Ella” is the primary track that illustrates the sonic differences between this release and Chris’ past efforts. The vocals are drastically cleaner and less ambient than in his self-titled EP or the Winter Split. The song also incorporates orchestration, layered vocals, and soft piano chords, which is a step away from Chris’ lo-fi stylings and into a more full, professional sound. “Ella” is not a bad track by any means, but it is a departure from the signature “home-recorded” warmth that makes Chris Kerekes’ previous music so inviting.

“Painted Wings”, the EP’s second track, uses some of the same new tricks as “Ella”, but they are well-woven into the signature Kerekes sound. The acoustic guitar is soft, warm, and plodding as Chris recollects abandoned aspirations in the lines “A man who ran out on his dreams/ Who looked like me.” A string section joins in on the chorus, but here the strings sound like a more organic addition than in “Ella”. There is some nice common ground in the track between Chris’ old sound and his understandable need to grow as an artist.

The EP has several highlights. The opening track “Fort Sam” finds Chris picking a fairly complex, but delicate pattern while reflecting on pessimism and its negative effects on a relationship in the lines ,“I never said anything good/Was not a man who held the flag.” The real highpoint is the EP’s fourth track, “To Celia”. The vocals are airy and haunting as Kerekes opens with a string of lines that yearn for a former self. “I’m a ghost/A shadow on a road/A reflection”. If that wasn’t good enough, he continues on the same track with “More dead leaves fall from my tree,” but pleads for a lifeline with “Won’t you rescue me/From my misery?” Ultimately, he acknowledges his own inability to move on, pondering “When will I see/I was not what you need.”

“Weave Me The Sunshine” succeeds by simultaneously expanding Chris Kerekes’ sound while still retaining the essential elements that make his brand of acoustic music unique and interesting. Some tracks fall short, but there is plenty to love on this EP. It’s not going to take the world by storm, but it’s perfect music for relaxing. Sometimes that’s all you need.

Rating: 3/4

“Weave Me The Sunshine” by Chris Kerekes is available on Bandcamp for the low low price of $3.

http://chriskerekes.bandcamp.com/album/weave-me-the-sunshine