Review Summary: one cop was enough.
It’s probably not the most appropriate name in regards to their music, but one can definitely agree that Your Skull My Closet is an attention grabbing name for a band that is, for all intents and purposes, a radio rock band. Forming in New York several years ago, YSMC take the generally inauthentic and distasteful 90s popular rock style and breathe life into it, through a combination of solid, hook-laden songwriting and a subtle awareness of the popular indie-rock styles of today.
We Find One Another is YSMC’s third EP, continuing on with what they brand as a ‘cantankerous, circuitous tour through anglo-rock’s recent history’. The EP’s seven tracks meld together remarkably, despite subtle differences in motivation – while a lot of the lyrical and thematic nature of the EP is tongue-in-cheek, YSMC is not afraid to show a softer side, one which throws out Brand New-esque sensitivity amongst the sexualised grit that cements the EP together.
One important factor which keeps drawing me back to this CD is a particular ‘thrust’ that it has – while the band excels in an otherwise standard formula of intricate guitar lines hovering over a driving rhythm section, this EP in particular manages to really initiate an interaction with the listener, so much so that one begins questioning why he can’t stop listening to what is supposed to be a highly shallow form of music. As much as the band tote the sexual elements of hair metal and glam rock to be a foundation for YSMC’s style, the resultant fusion of catchy songs and pop glaze bring this EP together in all the right ways.
Eschewing track specifics, this record is a neat and tidy piece of rock music – it caters for a specific audience, but its charms will undeniably create another.
