Not many bands can capture their live sound on record; the stage and the studio, the in-the-moment making of music, and the meticulous attention to detail are two very different disciplines, approaches that are opposites and which garner very different results. Now, I haven’t heard University Drive live, but I would say that if their stage sound is half as powerful, half as incendiary and intense, half as big and brutal as what we hear on their latest EP, First Stage Separation, then it must be one helluva experience.
Across six songs, the band blends the bleak and the beautiful, the deft and the devastating, walking a fine line between alt-rock and grunge, art and anarchy, muscle and melody, to create songs that, to use a cliché, are both very big and extremely clever.
“Hollow Sweetness” demonstrates their ability to craft towering sonic structures, songs that remind us that velocity and volume are not the only ways to get a song noticed. A more refined pace and poise, coupled with power and poignancy, when woven together, can hit just as hard as any raucous, four-to-the-floor, three-minute thrash! But, when you are looking for an instantly accessible foot-on-the-monitor, fist-in-the-air, Foo’s infused, slice of kick ass-ery, “Spin Out” proves that they are masters of that vibe too.
“Decades Lost” heads into more understated, gothic territories, the sort of thing that you might find Trent Reznor getting excited about, had he been fortunate enough to have penned it, and “Final Flash” is both a seering and sensational way to wrap the EP up.
If alt-rock has been around for a long time now, long enough to become the new mainstream, then this is alt-alt-rock —the new alternative to the once-alternative. Glorious stuff!
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