'Only Boundaries' Review #3
Balance and Composure- Only Boundaries (No Sleep Records)
Released August 11, 2009
It is quite rare now that you hear a 4 song E.P. that has the impact of a full length. Balance and Composure, a youthful five piece band from Doylestown, PA, have given us just that. All the songs are completely unique from one another, but all blend together smoothly. The record clocks in at just short of 20 minutes, just enough time for the band to show you what they’ve got.
The opening track, I Can’t Do This Alone, gives a taste of the bands creative sound. The bass line strongly backs the drum beat during the intro until the electric guitars notes are slowly picked out giving a somber feeling to the song. Something that you will find over the course of these songs is the band’s love for tempo changes with the music as well as the vocals. There will be moments that you want to close your eyes and relax, and then there will be others where you will want to scream the lyrics at the top of your lungs.
The title track Only Boundaries crashes in with catchy rhythm guitar backing some awesome riffs. This song very much reminds me of Brand New, as well as many other parts of the E.P with more relaxed verses and strong passionate choruses. Show Your Face is without a doubt my favorite song from this release. The drumming stands out and completely sets the tone on this track. The chorus swoops in as the lyrics, “The sky is your window, but where am I hiding?” are belted out. The bridge of this song makes you wish you were seeing it live at small venue because it is so perfect for a gang sing along. “I was never about this, never about this love” he screams as single epic strums of the distorted guitars ring out.
What’s Wrong With Everything is the slowest song on the record, but also the perfect pick as the closer. Once you reach the middle of the track, you start to feel the track build. It grows for quite sometime until the beautiful climax repeats a few times before finishing out the stellar release. This young band has put together something special here, who knows what they could do on a full length.
4 1/2 stars.
Review by Chris Bongiovanni
LINK: http://theinterlude.com/index…php?section=reviews&id=185
'Only Boundaries' Review #2
Balance and Composure- Only Boundaries (No Sleep Rec)
Though this band are all still youngsters (average age of the band= 18), they’ve been banging away for years in plenty of other PA indie bands like Erection Kids, War Pig and Scenic State. Coming off a very well received EP in 2008, ‘Only Boundaries’ sees the band pushing the limits of their songwriting with a perfectly crafted lesson in brevity in the area of introspective and meticulous songwriting (this runs under 20 minutes total).
At just 4 songs here, these kids make their point quick. The driving rhythms, singing vs. throaty screaming, and compelling emotive structures will bring to mind all the classics, but at the same time they retain their own distinctive sound. Sometimes moving at a faint pulse, other times exploding into a fiery rage, these 4 songs cover a lot of ground in a short time, pushing and pulling between mellow cathartic lulls to crashing drums and loud guitars. It’s not you’re standard build up from quiet to ebullient- this is dynamic, powerful and ebullient.
Great artwork and packaging and on a nice slab of vinyl (the 4 songs are on one side of the vinyl), this also comes with a CD of the 4 tracks. Limited to 500, so act quick. It really doesn’t get much better than this. Rumored to have a split with the amazing Tiger’s Jaw soon, too…
For fans of: Tiger Jaw, Elliott, Texas Is The Reason, La Dispute, Sparta, Quicksand.
Hear it: http://www.myspace.com/balanceandcomposure
Buy it: http://www.nosleeprecs.com
More info: http://www.beartrappr.com/balance-and-composure
LINK: http://www.go211.com/u/tomhaugen/blogs/6799
2 months ago • 0 notes'Only Boundaries' Review #1
Balance And Composure - Only Boundaries EP
All it took for these teenagers to earn themselves an immovable place in my heart was one debut EP titled “I Just Want To Be Pure”, 6 songs, 22 minutes. That album has since gone on to garner more plays in my library than any other album this year. A few months ago their label No Sleep Records released a sampler, as labels do, and on this sampler was a new Balance And Composure track: “Show Your Face”, I couldn’t contain my excitement. Quite to my surprise it was a much different sound to the previous songs, it was darker, angrier, edgier; and they’ve carried this sound on to their sophomore release “Only Boundaries”.
It’s only 4 tracks long, but to borrow a quote from the TV show House: “It may be short, but it has girth.” It’s not an overly-original sound they bring to the table, you’ll easily spot elements of alternative, indie, and emo (think Texas Is The Reason, NOT Escape The Fate) in the mix; but when they make music as compelling, addictive and downright awesome as this, you won’t care one iota.
On paper (whatever that means) the vocalist shouldn’t have a great voice, he’s not particularly powerful and his voice certainly does not soar, but when he executes that mumble-slash-groan of his, as heard best on “I Can’t Do This Alone”, or his choleric screams from “Show Your Face”, or his raspy wails towards the end of “What’s Wrong With Everything”, it’s hard not to get excited. His voice compliments morose lyrics such as “Your words cannot tell me that my neighbour is burning, for that I can’t believe. So tell me, am I burning too?” and such lyrics compliment his voice right back. You will find yourself singing along with their catchy choruses, or trying to imitate that screamy-throaty thing the vocalist does, and there isn’t much you can do about it.
They’ve established themselves as one of the strongest acts on the criminally underrated No Sleep Records roster, they’ve clearly got the talent, and with a split album coming out later this year with Tigers Jaw, it would seem the only way is up for Balance And Composure. They just need to hurry up and release a full-length! (but don’t rush it). [8]
Download: I Can’t Do This Alone, Show Your Face, What’s Wrong With Everything
For the fans of: Tigers Jaw, Texas Is The Reason, Ace Enders And A Million Different People, The Get Up Kids
Listen:Myspace
LINK: http://www.rockfreaks.net/index.php?page=albumreviews&id=2134
updidilydate
we’ve been demoing new songs for the past couple weeks. things are going really well. start the actual recordings in 12 days. we’ll post a video soon.
if you haven’t seen, we’ve posted a handful of shows on our myspace, including some halloween ones. check them out
3 months ago • 0 notes
yupdate: tour, record release, party
we’ve been doing a bunch of various things to get ready for our upcoming record release show and tour that we’re preety excited about. our record release is going to be held on august 9th in doylestown at some pavillion of which i am unsure how to spell the name of…however it should be fun. we’ll have our new record for sale as well as new shirts and stickers so come on out if youd like. you can check our myspace page or staggered works’ page for more info. a flyer will be made shortly.
tour booking is almost finished and we couldn’t be more excited to be going out with transit and man overboard. let the bonding begin. we will 100 limited edition I Just Want To Be Pure cd’s for sale. hand numbered with an added song to it. stay tuned. it’ll only be available on tour.
love
New Review
peep this review we got. stoked on the release, and the upcoming tour. Our record release is scheduled to be in Philadelphia on August 25th. Mark your shit.
we have been demoing new ideas, probably will see a video of the process. WORD IS BOND.
5 months ago • 0 notes