Crime In Stereo
Crime In Stereo Is Dead
Bridge Nine
Taking a huge step forward with the release of an album that almost didn’t happen, Crime Is Dead redefine themselves as a melodic hardcore band with far more depth than the restrictive genre will usually allow their artists to have.
To put them into context, this Long Island band are in the same pot as Lifetime, Hot Water Music, Kill Your Idols (with whom they have previously released a split) and Strike Anywhere. They’ve always straddled the mind-wrenching screaming/guitar shredding songs alongside the more sing-along-able, all the while maintaining their feet firmly planted in the world of hardcore.
After their 2006 release, The Troubled Stateside and the months of hard touring that followed, the band’s members began to inch off in new directions. Bassist Mike Musilli became a teacher at his hometown high school, and the band’s main songwriter and guitarist Alex Dunne became a political consultant for the New York State Democratic Party. Though vocalist Kristian Hallbert was taking vocal training and still jamming with drummer Scotty Giffin, it seemed as though the band was destined to fade, and so the Is Dead addition was added on to the band’s moniker.
Perhaps with the pressure of what comes next? being eradicated, the band began to write what would become this, their third album, and a new arena of melodic hardcore came with it.
“Unfortunate Tourist” and “Orbiter” are gorgeous in a manner usually reserved for the masters of ambient noise, Radiohead. Yet the album as a whole is not to be narrowed into one hole, “Animal Pharm” is a driving grunge meets surf rock pop song (got that?). It sways from one end of the room to the next and happily knocks over bodies on its way. And for the purists, punch into “Nixon” for one straightforward, stage-diving bit of healthy aggression.
Crime In Stereo is reborn.
Bridge Nine Records: http://www.bridge9.com
