Tune In & Drop Out
Pained vocals, good drums, nice ethereal guitar work. Admittedly the vocals take a little to get used to but these guys have something good about them, they have the rare talent of being able to get great energy into the songs without them sounding particularly loud. The choruses perhaps need a little work and the backing vocals aren't great but there's definite promise here. Two years in the making could either make for a disjointed final product or have allowed far too much time for tinkering thus leading to over production, fortunately they seem to have managed to avoid both these potential pitfalls.
Early highlights come with 'Shine Through' and 'Does it Mean Something', both of which have something of a chorus and are more rousing than the opening tracks. There is good musicianship on display throughout and by the fifth track I'm starting to wish they'd do a slower song just to see how they'd handle it but so far the opportunity hasn't arisen as they keep up the tempo and the underlying feel of repressed energy.
'You Are' hints at being a slower song, albeit only in the verse, but it still has that feeling of angst and doesn't really come close to ballad status. This title is taken by the following track 'Something Beautiful', well alright it's no ballad but it's as close to a slow song as we're going to get but it's something of a disappointment as it doesn't explore the depths that you feel they could. The album finishes with 'Make Yourself Strong', which returns to the now familiar upbeat formula but it lacks some of the appeal of earlier tracks.
We love to pick at press releases but this one's a good one, going to great lengths to point out that I Am the Door can't be pigeonholed and then in the next breath saying 'For fans of: The Pixies, Pink Floyd, The Clash, U2'! Quite frankly they sound nothing like any of those bands so I fail to see how that little nugget of information is of any help. If you really had to compare them to anyone they are probably closest in energy and style to White Rose Movement but with better tunes and without the heavy 80's overtones. When all is said and done they are as good as anything else around at the moment and probably have a lot more vim and vigour than many; they certainly don't come across as shoe gazers!