On Posture & The Grizzly’s latest record “I
Am Satan” the band sounds at their most mature yet delivering earnest emotional
moments, affected, sometimes very poetic lyrics and sweet melodies to spare,
showcasing a bright production, sweet vocals and a very clean instrumentation.
When
members of a well-stablished and experienced band decide to start a new side
project, sometimes stepping out of the shadow of a more notorious project can
be quite tricky, especially giving how obnoxious comparisons can be. In this
context, many bands spend an entire career (and very often in vain) trying to
figure out a way to come up with a truly representative set of songs that would
finally separate them from just being “X band’s side project”.
Posture
& The Grizzly feature members from their Connecticut pop-punk/emo
collective fellows TWIABP and ever since I first checked them out, it’s been very hard for me not
look at them as just some kind of TWIABP 2.0 only that less experimental and ambitious and while they’ve never sounded quite bad, they’ve always lacked, in my
opinion, that sense of authenticity, so to say, necessary to justify listening
to them in a world where TWIABP exists. However, on this new project the band
seems to have found the right balance between wearing their roots and
influences on their sleeve and crafting a distinctive sound.
The album’s
opening track “I am Not a Real Doctor” is in reality the first part of a
two-part song with a second version or rather part of it taking place right at
the album’s end. From the very start the band sounds genuinely emotional,
melancholic and contemplative and that’s definitely a deal closer here; this is
definitely the best the band’s ever been at songwriting so far. It’s one of the
hookiest songs on the album which makes it a perfect kick-off tune; plus, it’s
also lyrically moving. Lines like “I swear you loved miracles but there’s no gods
no disbeliefs; only evil caused by me” sound utterly honest and touching.
The album
breezily develops into an insanely solid set of tracks starting with “Elliot”,
followed by “Mandy”, “Raspberry Heart” and the rare instrumental passage that
actually works well, “Shooting Sparks”. In fact, the album’s biggest downside
is precisely that it never gets that consistent again. “Elliot” is definitely
one of the record’s most interesting highlights thanks to some carefully played
instrumentation and some reflective and a tad sorrowful lyrics (“Deleting
pictures off your phone in hopes that they burn. You’re wishing your life was
over, I’m wishing that I’d stay sober. Nothing can last forever”).
Tracks like
“Mandy” and “Raspberry Heart” will surprisingly have you humming and singing along
to lines as emotionally-driven as “Say you’ll never leave. Where’s my mind, deranged
like a killer” or “Honestly I hope I don’t see you again unless we started over,
so elated, so jaded”. By this time it’s clear the album’s is a very personal
meditation on the inherent complexity of relationships, interpersonal problems
and struggling with regrets and the past. “Shooting Sparks” works nicely as
some kind of instrumental interlude showing good drumming and nice production.
The album
drops down quality-wise on tracks like “The Undertow” which doesn’t ever sound quite fleshed out,
perhaps because of how short it is and how kind of generic the lyrics come off
for some reason. “Kill me” suffers from
a similar problem although the lyrics are more stirring and the other
instrumental passage, “Star Children”, feels completely unnecessary and brings
nothing to the table.
“Acid Bomb”
offers some intense (albeit too blunt at times) and very personal lyrics but
musically it doesn’t seem to work out and it’s not because the band doesn’t
sound fierce enough to match the lyrics because they do, but they clearly haven’t
mastered that sort of post-hardcore inspired vocal style they try to recreate
on that track so they sound rather flat instead.
However,
some of the album’s most stellar moments take place during the album’s second
half in the form of tracks like “Balloons as Hands” (“Let’s set this church on
fire, take a sentiment of all we are is art in making”) and especially “Delete
Me” a track as lyrically engaging (“The truth is that you don’t feel the same
way about me that I felt for you, so leave; some things are supposed to stay
together and all you could say, “Some things aren’t supposed to say together”)
as it is musically enjoyable (the bass here sounds lovely). The album’s
closing track dives further into the topics touched down on the album’s opener
only that this time around with even more emotion and a more subdued, organic tone
courtesy of some sweet acoustic guitar playing. The vocals are affected and
very emotive and it’s a perfect ending for the album.
With this
project Posture & The Grizzly prove that they have all the musical talent and
the emotional sensibility to create records both worthy of well-deserved
comparisons with bands like TWIABP and also capable of living on its own for
its own merits. Sure, the album’s got its flaws (the second half of the album
is sort of hit and miss) but the overall appeal of the album doesn’t suffer too
much from that due to the band’s wide array of strengths and it confirms
Posture & The Grizzly as an interesting talent to follow.
You can listen to the whole record in the link down below!
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