Robyn Writes

Review: Misgivings – Delete History [EP]

Hailing from Southsea but formed over beers in Hamburg, Misgivings make exactly the kind of noise you might expect them to. They trade in a kind of fast and loose punk style while retaining a melodic edge on this, their debut EP Delete History. And while it might start off promising enough, Misgivings are, unfortunately, a band who find themselves making missteps into pitfalls that many other punk bands find themselves guilty of.

The EP kicks off promisingly enough with ‘Century’, an insanely catchy bit of Bad Religion style punk with gruff vocals ripped straight from a Husker Du release. The writing and arrangement of the song has been thoroughly thought out and it quickly builds to a great, clattering conclusion. There are punk bands the world over who would kill to have a song like this in their catalogue.

Next up is the brilliantly titled ‘It’s a Bone, You Lucky Dog’ which after a sweet, melodic guitar intro turns into a pretty standard pop punk tune. Give it a bit of polish in terms of the production and mix and stick a pretty boy singer in there and you might as well be listening to Blink 182 or Taking Back Sunday. These guys know how to write a catchy song, it has to be noted.

From here on in though, the problems emerge. Misgivings are seemingly constricted by their expectations of what a punk band should do that they forget to have any ideas of their own. The songs on Delete History fail to make much impact when each of them sticks so rigidly to formula. It must be stressed that these are in no way bad songs, but surely there’s only so many times you can hear big intro/verse/chorus/verse/chorus/middle 8/chorus before it starts to get dull.

Misgivings are in no way a bad band and they certainly know how to craft a tune. If Delete History demonstrates anything, it is that there are bags of potential on show here, and this band just need to work on finding their own niche. It is a pleasant listen, it does nothing wrong, but will you remember it when it’s over?

3 out of 5 high fives!

Review: Trails – Crooked Trees

Guildford’s Trails have been building up quite the head of steam lately. Following support slots with the likes of Tellison, The Computers and Arcane Roots, Trails went cap in hand to their fans with a Kickstarter campaign to fund their debut album, Crooked Trees. To cut a long story short, the fans came through, Trails smashed their fairly modest target, and Crooked Trees got made.

Crooked Trees really speaks for itself. The album begins with a fiddly guitar intro before launching head first into a crushing riff, coupled with a guttural scream that ushers in track one – ‘Where We’re Going, We Don’t Need Roads’. The song is a breakneck hardcore thrill ride, with energy to spare and crossover appeal in spades. That said, it features a dizzying array of parts and a dense, complicated structure which lies far beyond the pale of mainstream rock music. It is a baffling display of skill and a tantalising overture of what is to come.

Next up, you get ‘Forever Black’, which kicks off with some pretty left-field Biffy Clyro-esque vocal harmonies before a stop-start Helmet riff trades phrases with black metal screams. The verses are fairly straight up punk, but the song ends when a ginormous swashbuckling riff comes out of absolutely nowhere for a couple of bars. This is clearly the work of a band who have more ideas in each song than most have in their entire back catalogue. It is completely disarming in the best possible way.

And the pace never lets up. They channel a more math-y Hundred Reasons on Echoes in Eternity, a more hardcore Reuben on Egos at the Door and some sort of indescribable Oceansize/Antlered Man mash up scenario on the frankly baffling Panthro. If you ever liked the band ‘A’ but thought they could really use a little bit more jazz in their sound, then the album’s absolute highlight, ‘Capgras Delusion’, is probably the song for you. Trails have thought of more or less everything and it is truly captivating to hear a band mercilessly shoehorning every single idea that they imagine inside sub-four minute slices of anthemic rock.

You could argue that Trails wear their influences a little too readily upon their sleeves at times, but you couldn’t ever accuse them of doing nothing new with these familiar formulas. Crooked Trees is a brilliant album from a band who can only go up.

4.5 out of 5 high fives!

Review: Darko – Sea Of Trees [EP]

Surrey’s Darko are a rare breed of band. When it comes to metal, you get bands who are blindingly skilful at their instruments but seem averse to putting any accessible elements into their music and are completely chorus-shy. You also get bands who can bring out an epic chorus with the best of them but have to stick to their Neanderthal drop-D riffs and run for cover at the mere mention of a guitar solo. Darko are a rare breed because they marry these two styles together; you get incredibly feats of musicianship coupled with super catchy choruses. This should be a world-beater, and yet…

Sea of Trees begins with an intro track, which always strikes fear into this reviewer. The EP should be a short sharp shock of a manifesto and few bands can get away with beginning anything with what is essentially filler. Darko’s ‘Prologue’ acts as a 30-second statement of intent, but what it truly amounts to is an intro and a verse which – given the time and development – could have turned into a killer song.

There is plenty to like on Sea of Trees. All of the songs display a dizzyingly high level of technical ability and musicianship with guitar figures that recall Architects, or even early Funeral For A Friend – the choruses are huge, and the production is slick and professional so you can hear everything clearly in the mix. The vocal attack is also impressive and when they allow themselves to switch gear into a more mathy, prog-styled instrumental section, as on ‘Canthus Viewpoints’, they prove that there are some pretty interesting ideas going on here.

The problem is that there is little if any variation on show here. Darko have proven they can do technical punk-metal but essentially Sea of Trees is a prologue and five songs which are more or less identical in terms of structure, length, tempo and style. If Darko want to go on to bigger things, they are going to have to learn some new tricks.

2 out of 5 high fives!

Review: Haze – Clouds Surround and Breathe

Nobody can claim that Haze is in any way, shape or form the most interesting or engaging band name in history, but in some ways, it is an appropriate one with which to describe the sound they make on debut Clouds Surround and Breathe. It’s an album of great scale that touches on many of the conventions of hardcore and post-rock, yet in places gets completely lost in a fog of its own ambition.

The album kicks off with an atmospheric, intricately layered, delay-drenched guitar intro that gently washes over the listener. Slowly, the drums build in the background, but this is the calm before the storm. If this an exercise in tension, the wave never truly, satisfyingly breaks before the end of the song.

Next up is ‘I Can’t Help But Get Lost’, which jumps straight in with absolutely no fanfare, but in its place an astoundingly blood-curdling vocal. There is a great deal of passion on show here, and the song sits somewhere between Russian Circles and the last Reuben album. What Haze could learn from Reuben though, is that sometimes you need to throw a hook in there. This is all blood, piss and vinegar, but there’s not a lot here that remains memorable, which sets off a disappointing trend for the rest of the LP.

Songs such as ‘Like Glass’, ‘Forma’ and Loomer all stick pretty much to formula. It is difficult to distinguish these songs from each other, never mind the vast multitude of fiddly, post-rock bands noodling for their lives at the moment. It isn’t that these are bad songs; it’s just that they seem almost terrified of deviating from what is expected of them. They also have a tendency to sit on an idea long past it’s sell by date.

That said, there are plenty of brilliant moments on show here. If you can’t find something to enjoy in the sprawling nine minutes of ‘Upheaval’, you probably aren’t a fan of epic post-rock and hardcore. Brutal hardcore rubs shoulders with fuzzy noise rock, as well as woozy alternative psych-rock. Then there is ‘Morrina’, which has its faults but you can’t fault this band’s ambition. Not to mention, some of the instrumentation here is really impressive, atmospheric and tasteful.

There is plenty to like on Clouds Surround and Breathe but as an album, it could do with plenty of fat being cut from it. This is a band who display a high level of musicianship and deliver passion in spades, but a few hooks here and there would not go amiss. This is an album for beard-stroking musos rather than lovers of the chorus.

2.5 out of 5 high fives!

Review: Moral Dilemma – Is Anyone Alive Out There?

Launched on the increasingly popular PledgeMusic, Moral Dilemma’s third and final album Is Anyone Alive Out There? can probably lay claim to being the most punk album of 2014. Funded by the fans for the fans, and having announced that they will play no final shows, this record is to be a send-off for a band who have given it everything for the past eight years. I’m going to be honest and say it straight off the bat – this is a perfect album. This is less a band riding off into the sunset after a shift well played and more a band scorching its way down to hell and taking absolutely everything else down with it.

Where previous Moral Dilemma efforts have been (and I mean this in the most flattering sense) kind of scrappy affairs with minimal production values and more or less paint-by-numbers hardcore punk, Is Anyone Alive Out There? showcases a band giving their legs one last glorious stretch. In terms of the step up these guys have made between albums; think the gap between Diesel and Power and Total 13 by Backyard Babies. Think Bleach to Nevermind. Think In Casino Out to Relationship of Command.

The album kicks off with a slow build up and a very metal guitar solo intro before giving way to the more familiar breakneck Moral Dilemma shtick. It’s an absolute thrill-ride, but this is merely the tip of a furious iceberg. Next up is album highlight ‘Lost Cause For Alarm’, which is the kind of tune Bad Religion would kill to come up with these days. It is full of impressive guitar fills and boasts an incredibly catchy chorus – exactly the sort of song that could launch a band right into the big time. With the two vocalists swapping lines, it’s almost like Johnny Foreigner high on petrol fumes.

It isn’t all gutter punk fury on Is Anyone Alive Out There? though, as the band have really diversified their sound. It’s almost like knowing this was their last roll of the dice, they decided to throw absolutely everything at it; kitchen sink and all. You get the rockabilly-skiffle-punk of ‘Spare The Vote, Spoil The Ballot’, you get Flamenco guitar tapping in ‘Evolution’, but perhaps the biggest surprise of all is in ‘Building Gallows’. This is another song with masses of crossover potential utilising a Hammond organ and a harmonica. It wouldn’t sound out of place on an album by their German gutter-punk counterparts Radio Dead Ones, or even – at a push – The Gaslight Anthem.

Put simply, there is not a bad song on Is Anyone Alive Out There? What Moral Dilemma are offering as their swansong is a relentless forty-minute sonic gut punch, and easily their best album by a considerable margin. This is an intensely vital listen and a wholly satisfying one at that. This is the kind of album that makes you fall in love with punk all over again.

5 out of 5 high fives!