For some reason, no one on Punktastic has reviewed this album before, and that’s just plain wrong. If you like The Swellers, Pulley, Millencolin, No Fun At All, Strung Out, Much The Same, This Is A Standoff or (early) Alkaline Trio then this is your new favourite band. Trust me.
Ryan’s Hope deliver poppy technical skate punk, but where the technical aspects of their music are limited by the band only being a three piece, they instead drop three way vocal harmonies, great songwriting, a (massive) shit eating grin and sing along anthems. It’s melodic and bouncy, fast and simple. Whilst the band sound nothing like Green Day per se, Terry Morrow the bands songwriter has the Billie Joe knack for writing brilliantly captivating 3 minute pop songs, albeit with a harder and more technical edge.
You don’t need to go much further than Majority for a whistlestop tour of everything that’s great about this album. My Motivation, Your Demise is another song that sticks out with it’s gang vocals, choppy riffs, purposeful breakdowns and the gleeful abandon it hurtles along with. When Life Steals Life further cements the bands style with a massive fist pumping chorus.
Ryan’s Hope definitely have the talent and the songs and probably should be as big as Set Your Goals by now, or any of the other pop punk big shots. Maybe its down to dumb luck but there is no doubt that if more people had of heard this album in 2006, an album I still listen to weekly three years after release, Ryan’s Hope would be massive.
Kieran