Seven Storey Mountain
Dividing By Zero (2002)
Scott Heisel
Seven Storey, formerly known as Seven Storey Mountain, seems to be the vision of one man, Lance Lammers. When I perused the band's webpage, I noticed that Lance is the only original member of the trio left. Most bands throw in the towel when a bunch of members leave, but not here. I have a feeling that Lance is not willing to let a kick ass band like this die out that easily.
"Dividing By Zero" kicks off with an instrumental that teases you with buildup after buildup, until finally the song rocks out to a close. This song fits a perfect opening song for a live show, and would serve as a great song to talk over. It's kind of hard to explain what I mean, but if you heard it, you'd get the same feeling. The album throws their best track up next, "Unknown Satellite." This song really does shred, and should be blowing up at college radio stations all across the nation. The next few songs kind of blend together as a Jawbox-meets-Foo Fighters mix until you hit track 6, "Halfway." Lance yells "Half the way" with as much conviction as he can muster, and when you add in his chunky guitar part, it makes the song a solid rocker. "No Return Address" drops the mood back to a more quiet, Pavement-esque instrumental [which, for some reason, has random noise of a modem connecting in the beginning of the track]. It calms the album down considerably. So how does the album get back into gear? Simple. The band put their second best song on the album, "Dress Rehearsal," next. This is the best song the Foo Fighters have never written. It's a nice up tempo punky tune with a creative guitar line and good tempo changes. After that, the last two tracks kind of run together as the album comes to a close.
The album definitely has strong points with tracks like "Unknown Satellite" and "Dress Rehearsal," but the majority of the rest of the album only displays the band's potential. Give this band 5 more years with this new lineup and I bet they'll be able to do something amazing. Until then, they're be in semi-heavy rotation on my college radio show, because that's where good rock like this belongs.