I don't know how many of you outside the ones that normally listen to screamo are catching wind of this, but year after year, Alone Records has quietly been putting out stellar releases. Jerome's Dream, Funeral Diner, You & I, Joshua Fit for Battle, Racebannon and many other seminal bands in that scene have put out records through Alone, and now you can welcome Bravo Fucking Bravo to that family.
Bravo's brand of intense, driving screamo has plenty of roots in both punk and rockân'roll, giving it a fairly varied sound without having to sacrifice anything in the way of intensity. With three of the band members all contributing vocals at one point or another, it seems as if the music is coming at you from a wide variety of different directions. The tight, pounding rhythms are the backbone to the entire album, but the scruffy, throaty screams are what pulls it all together. Think an even more intense version of Glass & Ashes, just less bass-driven.
It's not just one element at the forefront of II that makes it stand out, however, it's how nicely everything meshes together to make each song something new and something interesting. "Jean Claude God Damn," at only a minute and a half, goes through several stages and dynamics, making it one of the most complete songs on the entire album. "Friends With All the Dead Kids" has a much more back and forth, sing-song punk rock feel to it, and the dual vocal approach works better than the band could have even expected, and this song as well seems to go through different stages, trading their raging guitars and throat-shredding screams for short instrumental passages that only whet your appetite for more. To follow that up, "Doctor Hot Shit" has an extremely urgent feel to it, as the short bursts of vocals cascade over an extremely powerful rhythm section. Each line of the lyrics is screamed with such hard hitting, unwavering conviction that you can truly feel it.
There's no fault to be found anywhere on the band's Alone Records debut. Chalk full of well-channeled rage, intelligence, and killer rhythms, each song is just as well crafted as the last. Just the right mix of speed, power, and unwavering conviction go into every track on the album, and the multi-layered vocal assault is one of the best I've heard all year.
If Glass & Ashes was a part of the Alone Records roster, this would be the result, and from this end of things, color me impressed.