State Champs – The Finer Things
Packed with colossal hooks and melodies, State Champs’ debut album The Finer Things stands out as one of the best pop punk releases this year and raises the bar sky high for the genre.
Packed with colossal hooks and melodies, State Champs’ debut album The Finer Things stands out as one of the best pop punk releases this year and raises the bar sky high for the genre.
The foursome known as American Authors are about to be much more than the soundtrack to Lowe’s commercials (where you might recognize their single “Best Day Of My Life”).
Into It. Over It.’s sophomore album Intersections still contains his signature vivid guitars and genius lyricism, but ditches the more straightforward pop melodies for something rawer yet more complex. Evan Weiss returns to the roots of Into It. Over It.’s original recordings while also exploring new directions in his music, achieving two goals where artists normally strive for one.
On The Other Side, Tonight Alive display a newfound maturity and confidence accumulated over the past two years. These twelve tracks of passionate, driven pop rock are guaranteed to launch the band onto an entirely new level of success.
Disillusion is one of the most versatile records of 2013. O’Brother blend a multitude of genres and experiment with creative instrumentals and arrangements to artfully execute their self-defining sophomore record.
With Challenges, Farewell Fighter have easily picked up where they left off with their last EP and set out to make a better, stronger, and more complete set of tracks – which they have undoubtedly accomplished.
With ten songs packed with heart and aggression, the band strays from the laidback pop of their previous albums in favor of a more heavy-yet-melodic sound to get the message across on Golden Record.
With Bangs, the two-man team behind Brick+Mortar has managed to make untraditional music that will still appeal to traditional ears.
We Came As Romans’ new album Tracing Back Roots contains a lot of what their previous fans loved as well as a few surprises thrown in. While the album feels a bit stale at points, altogether it proves to be cohesive, uplifting, and appealing.
Love You In The Dark, the first solo effort of Now, Now’s Brad Hale, slides seamlessly from repetitively somber to ecstatic within the span of a few songs and explores all manners of human strength and weakness. It manages to find the gaps in the armor of humankind in the most delicate way possible, which is often a considerable feat for seemingly innocuous pop or electronic music.