Ehhh, this isn't as good as I was hoping it would be. The band basically plays a pretty standard form of rocked out hardcore, and that's cool, but it still doesn't do much for me. I'm definitely into the vocals, which are just relentless yells that have a lot of energy and attitude, but the recording is somewhat lacking, and that hurts 'em. It just sounds sort of thin, so the vocals feel separated from the music and the instruments just don't feel loud or powerful enough. The drums sound okay but have a weird sense of clickiness to 'em, the bass isn't robust enough, and the guitars are just too thin. They seem to be going for that lightly distorted rock tone, but there's still not enough volume or density there for the guitars to open up and run the show, so... they definitely need to beef up the sound to some degree. Musically I might compare 'em to The Suicide File, just with less energy to the songwriting. There's a good mix of faster traditional hardcore and midpaced chord progressions with smatterings of melody or quick little lead breaks, though honestly a part of me might be bothered by the fact that the whole "rock 'n' roll meets hardcore" thing has been pretty trendy in the past year or so, and I've admittedly grown tired of it. Opener "Get Pissed" is aptly titled in the sense that it's got more energy than most of the other material and cranks in right away - going so far as to jokingly toss in a quick ska riff at the end, "Where Did It Go?" is more melodic and catchy, "Given Up Hope" is a mere 16 seconds of blasting hardcore, and "Our Lives" starts with a killer bass break and somehow feels a little more aggressive once it gets going. The layout looks cool, though. The imagery is all bold and pops out, the text is cleanly arranged, etc. Despite humorous song titles like "Preaching to the Choir of Molested Boys" there's only one "fun" song that's sort of cheesy in the lyrical department ("Pizza Party"), so the bulk of the content definitely comes across as sincere and deals with things like friendships and trying not to take things for granted and that kind of stuff. Pretty standard, but they're convincing in my opinion. With a better recording this might come across as a much more forceful offering, but as it stands it's kind of boring to me. I'd be willing to bet that they're a damn solid live act, but... on record it's not clicking with me this time around.
[Undecided]
Running time - 20:00 (approximately), Tracks: 13
[Notable tracks: Get Pissed, Where Did It Go?, Our Lives]
Undecided Records - http://www.undecidedrecords.com
