The Bitter Life Typecast/Elementary Thought Process "split" 7"
[Outreach]
The Bitter Life Typecast starts out with one track of awesome indie rock/emo that sort of reminds me of Sunny Day Real Estate in some ways. It's got a nice dark, somber atmosphere, there's a lot of excellent interaction between the guitars and bass, the percussion is forceful, and the singing is mixed far back in the distance. There seem to be some mild synth textures also (I think that's what they are?), but they're handled well and play a small role. I like this better than their other work that I've heard as the songwriting just flows better and creates a more interesting atmosphere. The recording is nice and thick, and even though the guitars could use some warming up and the vocals might not hurt if they were a little louder, it sounds very nice as is. Elementary Thought Process is... well... not nearly as good. Their track is far more experimental, starting out with just vocals and gradually introducing reversed guitar parts and what sound to me like programmed drum beats. I like the sound of the guitar parts (especially once they flip and start playing forwards), and the drums (programmed or not) sound fine to me. But the vocals... something about the vocals is annoying, and I know part of it is that the harmonies are painfully wrong. The notes just clash like a motherfucker. I don't know. With some more practice in the singing in key department this song could be really cool, but the vocals hinder everything for me. The 7" is pressed on opaque white vinyl and comes in a simple sleeve with a less than effective layout, but what can you do? All of the imagery and text is somewhat blurry and/or pixilated, there are no lyrics or anything included, the artwork is sort of visually uninteresting, etc. I don't know. The Bitter Life Typecast's track is very cool, but unfortunately that can't save the record as a whole. (5/10)
Running time - 9:00 (approximately), Tracks: 2
[Notable tracks: Sympathy Card]
Outreach Records - outreach_records@hotmail.com

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