No Chance for Boredom
The Red Verse’s debut entices listeners with familiar sounds
The Red Verse
No Chance for Romance
Released on Aug 08, 2008
The Red Verse, formerly the Reverse, made their clever transition in the San Francisco bay area almost three years ago with their familiar sound. The Red Verse are the Tarantino’s of the music world. As confusing as this comparison sounds, let me explain. Their style pays homage to many classic bands such as the Strokes, Johnny Cash, and 60s Brit-pop but never evokes the desire to call the band copy cats. Just like how Quentin Tarantino borrows heavily from classic noir and samurai films but is still called a visual genius. Yes, they borrow ideas and styles from the best however they still offer some of their own flash to make it less of a direct copy and more of an original work. The Red Verse has excelled at this on their debut EP No Chance for Romance.
No Chance for Romance is short in length but it’s close to twelve minutes of crisp rock
makes it worth the listen. The opener “Circles” is a dizzy
dance to lead singer Alex Oneil’s throaty voice and the band’s garage
rock sound. The thing that makes garage rock so appealing in contemporary
music is it’s simplistic style, so calling “Circles” simple becomes
a compliment more than a criticism. The track isn’t overly burdened
by different influence and sticks close to a garage rock, vintage pop
rock formula that makes it a fantastic way to start the album.
The EP follows this formula, using that classic guitar that made bands
in the 60s stand out and a lot of vocal reverb to guide us through the
Red Verse’s debut. From the heavy crunge of “Rattle Your Bones”
to the doo-wop surf rock of “On the Run,” there’s never a moment
where the Red Verse denies you auditory pleasure.
So how could No Chance for
Romance go wrong? It really can’t. The four tracks
off of the EP are each well-produced and entertaining and the audience’s
connection to it is immediate. Throughout No Chance for Romance we experience this collision of revival rock with vintage rock, which
makes the EP a throwback and contemporary at the same time (think the
show Quantum Leap without the sidekick Al). This helps the EP
overall, since nothing too unfamiliar to disillusion listeners.
There are times I wished the Red Verse could have pushed their craft
a little farther than the standard, but there’s no denying that the
band is good at what they do. Why mess with a good thing?
High Point
Lead singer Oneil’s voice sounds like the illegitimate child of David Byrne and Interpol’s Paul Banks (that is, if two men could procreate).
Low Point
Despite their success of blending fantastic styles and genres together, it would be nice to see the Red Verse develop an individual and defining style on their next release.
Posted by Amy Dittmeier on Feb 03, 2009 @ 8:00 am