Not Advised are a quartet of south-east based pop-punks who play a brand of Sugarcult-infused rock that also nods towards the likes of latter day Sum 41 and, at times, Alkaline Trio. While that may sound like the kind of thing every local band plays, these boys do it quite well. Sure, it didn’t blow my head off, but these three songs are more than competent. The guitar work, expecially on opener ‘Listen Up’, is fantastic while the structures and attempts at three-way harmonies should certainly be welcomed. If this is a taster of things to come, then Not Advised will be ones to watch.
Of course it’s not all sweetness and light and while the band should be congratulated in the main, there are a few glaring errors. For a pop-punk band their choruses aren’t quite catchy enough and the hooks certainly didn’t have me singing along. The vocals are also an acquired taste – one minute they hit the notes, the next (during the latter half of ‘Guns at Midnight’ for example), they sound horribly out of tune. Still, this is far better than most of the demos we’ve been getting in recent weeks and a lot of hard work over the next months could see them start to make an impact.
www.notadvised.tk
Paul