I know nothing about this band and I don't think I've ever heard them before, but apparently they were around for four years starting back in the late-90's and people liked them enough to warrant a double-CD discography of their work.? At times they're sort of unique, I'll give ?em that.? The music is kind of a blend of screamo, indie rock, metalcore, and math rock that hits on everything from solid melodies (see the awesome "Double Who?? Double You!") and clean passages to chunky rhythmic elements and tons of frantic and chaotic riffing that has more of a dissonant and acerbic bite.? Musically the only thing that's sort of creative is that they blend a lot of styles, the actual riffs themselves are somewhat commonplace and at times pretty generic.? The vocals on their final outing (the "Presents" CD EP), though, were apparently a big shift: Some sort of weird spoken delivery with effects and such, which sounds really different for the genre considering the music.? But all of the other vocal work consists of straight up yelping screams.? I personally find all of the vocals to be distracting, but the spoken stuff was far more effective because it just sounded plain as opposed to the screaming, which can be incredibly obnoxious.? It's a shame, because musically they're tight as fuck and I actually like it for what it is.? This whole thing isn't really my style, though I can appreciate it at times, and with a stronger vocal performance I'd really dig this.? The songwriting is short but sweet and they drop some great riffs, but the fact that the playing is so tight really makes them more powerful than most of these types of bands.? The stuff can get pretty heavy and hard hitting as a result of that.? Disc one contains most of the "Presents" CD, the "Seeing Means More Than Safety" 10", the split 10" with Orchid, and the split 7" with The One AM Radio.? Disc two contains split 7"s with Usurp Synapse, July, and Amalgamation; the split 5" with The Book of Dead Names; compilation, demo, live, and unreleased tracks; and the other song from the "Presents" CD EP.? Much of the band's output was recorded by Kurt Ballou, so of course there are some great sounding tunes here.? They were a trio, so my favorite aspect of the cleaner stuff is that the bass tone is massive and plays an equal role in the mix, thus playing a large part in how heavy some of the material sounds.? Seriously, some of their later work has an absolutely incredible bass sound, and I really enjoy that.? Sometimes the mixes are a little raw and details get lost, but for the most part all of the material on the first CD sounds surprisingly solid and the listen is fairly consistent.? When things do get really raw (notably on "Untitled Number Two") it sounds intentional and works regardless, so... Disc two is a different story as things end up getting pretty dirty and rugged, to the point where it can be hard to stomach. But impressively enough even these songs are performed with extreme precision, so some of the music still comes off very convincingly. There were a lot of really nice clean breaks back in those days as well. Now, here's where I get really picky. I have this thing with discography CD's where I'm pretty particular about how they're handled. For the most part this one is handled great, but there are some annoying little details that frustrate me. First of all, the material's not technically in any logical order. It's sort of in reverse chronological order, except that one or two songs are out of sequence, and for some idiotic reason the last track from "Presents" appears at the end of disc two rather than on disc one with the rest of the EP. What makes this even more absurd is that the 16+ minute track is really just a four- to five-minute song plus 10 minutes of dead air and then a few minutes of drumming. What the fuck? Had they chopped that shit off (And why not? That shit doesn't matter!) they could've fit everything onto one damn disc! Beyond that, the packaging looks pretty nice. It's clean and consistent with a few band photos and lots of white space, etc. But why are there no details at all about any of the live or unreleased tracks? No titles, no lyrics, no recording information, nothing. Why is that? There's a decent amount of detail elsewhere, so what gives with the absence of documentation for these songs? The lyrics are included for most of the tracks, but they're often pretty awful, ranging from the overdramatic and emotional to the hokey and sarcastic. I mean, the liner notes (what little there are) are sappy as hell, and the last line in the booklet is, "Please make your lives extraordinary." Common enough for these kinds of bands to feel that way, but then there are lyrics like, "You stabbed me in the face, " or, "I cut off my arm, but it still didn't compare to the shock of losing you." No thanks, you know? In the end the second disc comes off as somewhat worthless for me, but I do like the first disc and I can see why fans of this style would be into this band. So if you're really into this stuff, my guess is that this release would interest you. I think the manner in which things have been arranged could have been handled in a more logical fashion regardless of whether or not they chose to go the double-CD route, and fans of the band would've probably much preferred to have more information about the unreleased material or more substantial liner notes, but what can you do? Not bad for what it is, I suppose.
[Alone]
Running time - 75:00 (approximately), Tracks: 42
[Notable tracks: Double Who?? Double You!, The Monologue of the Century, A Well Documented Case of Severe Autism, Thirty Dollar Bill]
Alone Records - http://www.alonerecords.com
