StanXa are a four-piece from Dover who state they have a sound which ranges from ‘pop-punk to fringe metal’. I didn’t realise hair metal had evolved for the emo generation, but it’s a rad name for a genre nonetheless. Anyway, enough of my comedy club and on to the songs, a bizarre collection of tunes which shows promises but has one major, major problem – the vocals.
Now I’ve given young Thomas Lennard a chance by listening close several times to this EP, a collection of demos, but the vocalist does not fit the music his band play. Now I don’t mean to be cruel at all, but while the musicianship is of a relatively high standard, the vocals ruin everything. They don’t sound in the right key, they sound badly produced and aren’t high enough in the mix. There’s no power, strength, passion – quite simply they don’t make any impact on the songs at all. He reminds me of the chap from JJ72, all airy and Irish but trying to front a band that certainly have elements of post-hardcore in their sound as they stop and start and change frequently. Put simply it does not work.
Things go on too long as well, opener ‘Caught In Headlights (On a Christmas Night)’ rattles on for six minutes when three would suffice, while second track ‘Lovebites’ has a great musical accompanyment but the lyrics and vocals are crap. This is being ultra harsh I know, but I’m being honest – in this current guise StanXa won’t make it. Either the vocalist changes his style or the band go nowhere, it’s quite simple. ‘Wound’ is better because there are less warbles, but the vocals are again too choir-boy in style; it’s noticeable that when he gets aggressive the song sounds infinitely better.
As musicians StanXa show a maturity to their sound to make it interesting, but as soon as the vocalist starts everything slides downhill. The songs are too long, making them lose their appeal – 25 minutes for a four-track record is hard work at the best of times. There’s talent here, but a lot of work needs to be done to shine an extremely rough diamond.
www.stanxa.co.uk
Paul