Review: The American Scene- By Way Of Introduction (2011)

Band: The American Scene

Release: By Way Of Introduction

Genre: Indie

Members: Charles, Matt, Chris, Dave, Zac

Label: Pure Noise Records

Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/theamericanscene

Buy the album here: http://itunes.apple.com/us/album/by-way-of-introduction/id417784540

Tracklist:
1. By Way Of Introduction
2. Did You Hear About Your Friends In California?
3. Last Chopper Out Of Saigon
4. Home
5. Marty Mcfly, Nostradamus, and I
6. Killed Off In The Second Act
7. Another World Beater
8. This Is Rebirth
9. A Million Minutes In The Making

Review: 8.4/10

The American Scene is a band from Berkeley, CA that’s only been around for a short time, but have already released the album By Way Of Introduction under Pure Noise Records on March 8^th, 2011. If you’ve heard of Razing Alexandria then you may already be familiar with the Vincent brothers, who are in both bands. Just like Razing Alexandria, this band is mostly vocal driven with the music flowing with the vocals instead of the other way around.

“Did You Hear About Your Friends In California?” is a indie song with a slight pop punk feel that deals with watching someone, probably an ex, from afar that you still have feelings for, but you feel that they are wasting time with the person they are with. As evidenced in the chorus lyrics “I traded best friends in for distance and a sense of something real/But, I could never change the way you make me feel/I'd rather bury myself alive than watch you/bury yourself in someone else's wasted time/'cause we were never wastin' time.” The guitars keep the melody of the song, during the chorus the crashes are used a lot, but the mix of the sound puts them in the background instead of being prominent in the front.

“Killed Off In The Second Act” is my favorite song off of the album. The lyrics are very powerful and they seem to have an underlying meaning to what’s actually being said. As my interpretation of the track, it’s about how the singer is reminiscing about his past, but not about the good things, but instead of thinking of good things, its about of the bad things and using drinking as an escape from it all, as shown here,“I spend days on end thinking about people who've got better things to do/And my nights with my head spinning making my old friends brand new/21 has made it damn hard to believe that this could ever be enough for anyone.” Other than having the guitar as the main driving force like the last song, the drums is the instrument that keeps the momentum going.

Overall, this album is vocally driven. By that I mean the instruments stand behind the vocals the entire time and don’t really take any sort of prominent role. But as a huge fan of Razing Alexandria, I can say that this isn’t such a bad thing. You really have to sit down and listen to the lyrics more closely to get the full effect of this album.