The Matches

Life Of A Match [7-inch] (2015)

SilentMark

In 2014, The Matches celebrated their 10th anniversary of the release of their first album E. Von Dahl Killed The Locals. This put a temporary end to their hiatus, coming back to do several anniversary shows, a couple of Christmas shows and to release a live record one one of said shows.

This spurred them on to write a couple of new songs and release the seven inch "Life of a Match/Crucial Comeback".

"Crucial Comeback," the B-Side to the seven inch is a catch surf pop/rock song. A catchy chorus, a nice stereotypical hook and a fun little song about not wanting to write a song about a girl. It's a nice idea and because of the topic of the A-Side, it has the air of parody about it. A nice B-Side.

Here's the reason for this review. The A-Side, "Life a of a Match." What a song! Going along the same musical stylings of their 3rd album A Band In Hope, "Life Of A Match" is a wonderful song and a perfect commentary on music lately.

The third and forth lines in the song say everything you need to know about the bands they grew up touring with. "And the bands on all my shirts, had all since broken up, or adopted a more commercial sound". Considering The Matches have toured with the likes of Fall Out Boy and Blink 182, you can tell they're speaking from truth.

In the nearly 5 minute song they say a lot. "(Don't you ever wish) our generation, made anything worth saving" has probably been on the minds of all of us lately. Music has become so disposable that it doesn't matter to many, and seems the same to many of the creators. YouTube artists and bands now come go and it doesn't seem to be getting better.

The whole song seems to have an air of a 30 something guy who lived in the pop punk world wondering where enthusiasm in the scene went In the age of the selfie, gigs have become a place of annoyance. I am this guy, I'm the way wondering these things. I'm the guy annoyed by these things. I'm a 30 year old pop punk fan who misses gigs where we were enthusiastic about the band on stage. The song was basically me shouting at the music world.

If this is what they can produce when they are together again, I really hope The Matches have another round of songwriting when they do their Decomposer reunion shows.