Album Review: Post-Nothing

This was an album that I picked up mostly because I had heard of the band without having ever actually heard them. And I thought the album cover looked pretty cool, like all the other black and white pictures on this blog. I really was expecting more of an indie rock subtly-gilding-roses Post-Nothing but was pretty pleased to have that expectation turned right on its head. These guys really wail out their choruses, which I've heard before from bands that sound like what I want to call alt-punk-pop, but these guys nail it for me. Sincerely wailed vocals over severely down picked and amplified chords work to produce something that is familiar but also somewhat endearing. The way they sing about hating girls, young guys leaving town, and rocking out, these are all familiar motifs in rock and roll. I guess if I would have one complaint is that they seem to stay fairly in the box with their sound, structure and lyrics. It's not like they don't do any of it well, but I'm not sure their pushing anything or doing anything provocative. A couple of times I kind of wondered if this was really just a creed side band, which sounds pretty bad on the outside, but a well produced, bread and butter, get your common rock tropes here album is pretty much what creed made, and in some ways what the Japandroids are doing. Now on some tracks they do really dig into grooves and let loose on some stuff that is probably too left of center to really fit the whole creed comparison, and when they do that I them best.  I would recommend checking out the whole album as its pretty short light and fun, but the tracks Young Hearts Spark Fire, Wet Hair, and Heart Sweats really made me feel the most energetic and happy listening to them. In a popular video on the power of music, Oliver Sacks quotes Emmanuel Kant as calling music the "quickening art" and although this music is sometimes slowed by how much it plays into common tropes, it's sincerity and lightness really make it a fun and enlivening listen. Try it!