Review Summary: The (possibly) best punk EP of the year appears!
There’s nothing like a pleasant surprise in music. Miles Paralysis’
b0nx seemed to come out of nowhere and leave a significant impact on me. This EP is so concise, so musically interesting and so ironically catchy that it feels like the kind of record that defines the phrase “all killer, no filler”.
The band is comprised of Jon Markson (who has contributed to similarly excellent-but-massively-underrated bands such as Such Gold and Taking Meds) and Alex Litinsky, who both play various instruments on the album, with the only clear distinction seemingly being that Markson played all the bass and Litinsky all the drums. The rhythm section is so impressive here though that it’s clear both members contributed seemingly equally to this awesome release.
Perhaps the best thing about
b0nx is that it is something of a weird entry in the “pop-punk” genre. I’m not even sure the album should be attributed to that genre (though it’s clear it uses its toolset) since there is little “pop” about the songs here —
b0nx instead meshes pop elements together in extremely dense and speedy sections, with melodies that rise and fall sporadically and rhythms that stop and start just as crazily. It’s quite a triumph in conveying that pop-punk still has some truly new things to offer; this is to say that even though the songs contain a lot of these catchy little earworm moments, I found the melodies to feel refreshingly catchy as opposed to the traditional chorus hooks so prominent in the genre. Even if a good chorus is a trick that never really gets old, it’s great to see the genre feel so progressive here. And despite such a jagged construction, the album still achieves a warm and sunny atmosphere that is quite alluring.
b0nx is a very short EP so I would feel a little strange rambling about it for too long, but it would be a glaring omission to not praise how the album sounds not only progressive (in the sense of innovation) but also impressively technical. The instrument that stands out the most to me in this respect is the drums. Make no mistake, the percussion work here is absolutely incredible, and I think that drummers who think they have heard every rhythm that can fit into pop-punk would have a challenging time dissecting the intricate parts here. I found the drums to really push the songs to that next level — the little gallop beat into blast beat section in opener “Luna/Kya” for instance makes the part sound totally euphoric. The drums of course are properly accompanied by the other instruments, and so I would also recommend this album to fans of technical rock music who aren’t usually interested in pop-punk. Ultimately,
b0nx is a great EP and I can’t wait to see where Miles Paralysis goes from here.
