The Kinison

Mortgage is Bank (2003)

Scott Heisel

The Kinison are Fearless Records' newest signing, and they couldn't escape the Fearless curse. What is the Fearless curse, you ask? It is that no matter what band they sign, the band in question bears at least a passing resemblance to either Bigwig or At The Drive-In, the label's two most successful bands historically.

So which does The Kinison sound like? Well, sort of a conglomeration of both and neither. Contained on this 5-song EP is some fairly straightforward angsty dark punk songs that Bigwig could have written on a more depressed day of band practice. It's not skatepunk, but I'm willing to bet that at one time it was.

The At The Drive-In influence comes in a bit sneakily, found in some guitar riffs dropped here and there [see: "New Way To Dance"] and stacatto vocals with machine gun rapidity [see: "Hey Hey Hey"]. The band also uses a fair bit of screaming in these five tracks, but it doesn't come off as trite, which is beneficial to these Canadians' collective causes. Lyrically, this band doesn't come even close to touching ATDI, but at least they're not directly trying to ape the band's sound like another band on the label [Brazil, anyone?].

There's potential here, but that's about it. Out of the five songs, the only one that leaves a positive imprint on my mind is "The Way I Used To Be," a slow rocker that has some nice singalong parts. Download it below, and see what you think.

Bands like this and Anatomy of a Ghost seem to be the future of Fearless Records, and while both aren't mining any new territory, they are solid additions to a roster that desperately needed some. It's worth a listen.

MP3s
Sorry, I'm A Pushover
New Way To Dance
The Way I Used To Be