Another band out of the Cartel/Sherwood melodic school of emo-rock, Just Surrender (formerly A Second Chance) do this cliched style of music pretty well. Sure, they don’t hit any new ground and they won’t be tearing up too many trees in the coming months, but this is pretty nice stuff. So nice, it’s destined to make my MP3 player for my summer holidays and will accompany me on many trips to the beach. I can certainly see myself listening to this if I want some easy listening; June are another band that you could compare them too, maybe Self Against City or Spitalfield too.
The first half of this album is far better than the second. The shouty verse/chorus structure is hardly new, but the melodic parts have enough singalong hooks to keep you interested. Songs like ‘I Can Barely Breathe’ and ‘Of All We’ve Known’ have really solid hooks and sucked me in after only a few listens. Sure, it is disposable, but it’s a pretty fun listen all the same. It’s a trait the band carry on throughout, but as the songs go on – and there are 10 of them – each one seems to drag into another. This is more because there’s a lack of variety as each song starts/ends the same as the one before, with one exception – the token acoustic song, which is dreary and bland. Still, I’m not yet waving the white flag, which, for Just Surrender, must be a good thing.
www.justsurrender.net
Broken English Records
paul