When it comes to mathy post hardcore, I don’t even hear the melody on the first couple of passes. Maybe having a very limited experience with playing instruments I have an appreciation for the sheer skill and practice it must take to get to this level of technical playing, and I just get caught up in the virtuosity of the tracks. Add another technically incredible band to the list Regret, The Informer out of Kansas City who just sent in their latest single “Less than three” on Stink Cat Records.
On A-Side’s “Tour De Franzia" it feels like the ghost of At The Drive In is thankfully still rattling around in impressionable skulls. The influence is heavy with dual guitar histrionics and an equally screamy vocal tracked with impossible call and response vocals between members. Choppy alternate tuned guitars split back and forth channel complex constructed melodies and speed hardcore bursts. "LOSING MY MIND!" The yell delivery in every direction, from growly black metal to emo but consistently keeping it reigned into well-constructed off-kilter post hardcore. Haven’t heard anything like this in a long time, with good reason, it takes undeniable devotion to the genre to remotely pull this off "Sleeveless in Seattle" - proof that anyone who can come up with Don Cab names like this has to be ok. They’re fingering crazy melodies in off time signatures, screaming back and forth hinting at a bigger melody but more in love with The Dismemberment Plan sound. It’s an attempt to baffle the listener every measure with their intense attention to detail. This is never going to be background music - this sort of thing takes hold immediately in the front of consciousness. At least with the 7” single there’s some breathing room after these bursts to let it really sink in. They aren’t against experimental tangents either; playing around with a reverse cymbal they have to examine every aspect in an attention to detail anyone can appreciate. Real freaking craftsmen. Like checking out some kind of side of the road chainsaw sculpture only to find it's been inlayed with all kinds of different wood and hand polished. Why would anyone do this except they don’t want to anything else?
B-Side’s "Good Morning Drug" has a pounding pop beat, I’m questioning if this is even the same band. I knew this pop foundation was lurking all along and the yelling starts in with a change back into fragmented post core, the bombs dropping alongside Gatling gun bursts. Extremely complex with an odd feel like its constantly teetering on the edge of a cliff combined with this frantic angst its a nervous gut wrenching trip with a lot of emotion to take in. Abstract as shit vocals, you’ll have to find your own way through this minefield of verse but they mean business. I also like this great sleeve that’s weirdly wax coated paper with lyrics and a hidden track of subtle backwards-static collage. They keep pulling out tricks like these, swapping genres. Magic.
Get this from Stink Cat Records.
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