Category:
Punk

Try if you like:
Catch 22, Mad Caddies, Mustard Plug, Suicide Machines, Voodoo Glow Skulls

• We Will Fall Together
•   We Will Fall Together

Finally, after around three years of waiting, Streetlight Manifesto fans have the band’s sophomore album. Granted, the remake of Catch 22’s 1998 album Keasbey Nights was a new release for the band, but Somewhere in the Between marks the true followup to 2003’s Everything Goes Numb.

 

As a longtime fan, I have come to terms with the fact that for me, the band’s debut will never be topped by subsequent releases. However, what we have here is a record that is well within spitting distance of the same level of awesome found on Everything Goes Numb.

 

It opens with We Will Fall Together, an angsty brass powered force that closely rivals Everything Went Numb, the first cut on their old album. These similarities exist elsewhere on the album, but this is not by any means a bad thing. Certain horn licks seem to baldly recall older songs, as if the band made a conscious decision to shed light on older material. And why not? The reworking only serves to improve perspective on the musical intricacies of both albums.

 

You may have noticed that I’m devoting very little to the songs themselves. This is because the individual tracks are everything you would expect from Streetlight Manifesto: memorable horn melodies, rapid fire, catchy lyrics with gigantic singalong choruses. One noteworthy difference I found is that the songs have an ever so slightly different structure that leans to a noticeably more orchestral influence, with small themes and motifs that arrive, catch your attention, and disappear as quickly as they came. This, along with significantly more militant (and less whiny) themes and subject matter, mark a distinct newfound maturity (this is the second such milestone, the first being the graduation from frontman Kalnoky’s style on Keasbey Nights to Everything Goes Numb). 

Somewhere in the Between is a nice addition to Streetlight’s repetoire, but it might be time on the next album to take things in a bit of a different direction. For the time being, though, this is a perfect match for fans that have been there since the beginning as well as anyone new to the fanbase.