| CD REVIEW Deadly Sins |
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Band : Deadly Sins Boston based Deadly Sins may be a novelty to many, but the individual band members have already left their mark on the local and international Punk Rock scene! Take lead singer Stephanie Dougherty for instance, who started DS at the beginning of 2006 with lead guitarist and co-singer Billy Brown. Known from working backstage with Dropkick Murphys since 2002 (for whom she manages the merchandize booth), she's recorded with such artists as Roger Miret & The Disasters (on the band's 2002 self-titled debut album she did guest vocals on 2 songs), Lost City Angels (not sure what album she contributed to, but I suppose it was their self-titled debut of 2003), and she did the backing vocals to the Dropkick Murphys hit single "The Dirty Glass" (pulled from the 2003 album Blackout), and has regularly appeared on stage with the band, goccasionally giving a couple of other songs the benefit of her vocal backings as well. Billy formed Punk Rock 'n' Roll band Crash And Burn in the late '90s, released 3 full-length albums, and toured heavily. The band called it quits in 2005, and after he and Stephanie had started working together on the DS material, he brought in his former bandmate Joe Packard on the bass. Guitarist Brendan Maguire is perhaps best know from his work with that other Boston based Hardcore act Reach The Sky, who called it quits in 2003 after two full-length albums and 6 years of worldwide touring. After a couple of years of working behind the scenes, he felt it was about time to get into a live band again, and since he was already a lifetime friend of Stephanie's, the choice of people to work with was readily made. Finally, there's drummer Nathan Bice of Chicago's acoustic Pop Punk act Even In Blackouts (with whom he's been touring all over the world since 2004). He's also worked as recording engineer and drummed for the likes of The Queers and The Generics. As soon as February 2006 the fresh band had released their self-titled EP, and after some touring the quintet went into the New Alliance studio (in Cambridge, Massachusetts) to record the material for their full-length debut with engineer and co-producer Dean Baltulonis (of The Hold Steady, Bouncing Souls, Sick Of It All repute), mixing it at Dean's own The Wild Arctic studio in NYC. Earlier this year, Dropkick Murphys did a tour (which of course meant Stephanie was on the road as well) during early March, and after that they went off to Europe...inviting DS along for the ride. Right before that though, DS posted a couple of videos from their Valentine's Day gig in Boston on their MySpace. Musically, this band continues in the great tradition of American Street Punk acts, with that difference that here's a woman singing the leads. And Stephanie has a very nice voice...not too abrasively high-pitched, not too often used in an aggressive mode, but with a definite strength underneath. Some of the songs she hardly gets any vocal backings, but most of the time she doés, and when Billy goes into a more aggressive mode he kinda drowns the female singing out. But that only happens in a coùple of songs ("Riot", parts of the overall calmer "Freshly Minted Royalty"), and in the overall more vocally aggressive "Unpaid Bills" the lady indeed stands her ground! And then there's a couple of songs ("Ashes" with its Celtic-influenced intro, and "Street Lamp") where Billy takes over the lead vocal role...and I'm not even sure whether it's Stephanie performing the backings there! But there's also plenty of passages where the two sing in such unison as to be a perfect match. Two songs could be seen as a semi-ballad: the aforementioned "Freshly Minted Royalty" with its calmer opening and in between part doés however finish in a shared aggressive vocal mode; album closer "Non-Believers" however remains vocally calm overall, even when the guitar picks up slightly in intensity...and for sure there's either an additional bit of violin (or a keyboard sounding as such) in the song as well. Of coùrse the intensity goes even further up for the guitar solo, but that's why it's called a semi-ballad, isn't it? End conclusion: definitely an album that needs a couple of (headphones) listening sessions, before you strart to réally appreciate...but once you've come to that stage, you'll be moving most of your body parts along to the catchy melodies! Oh well, you can listen to a couple of songs at myspace.com/officialdeadlysins (including a song not on the album), but really you can also listen to a stream of the whóle album at punknews.org/bands/deadlysins (link in one of the blogs). And then there's a total of 3 videos, one recorded clip for the track "Freshly Minted Royalty", the Valentines Day's videos being for album opener "Grey Skies Turn" and a Smiths cover. Do I like what's on offer? What's not to like? Do yoù like? Why don't you find out? Why don't I stop all these silly questions...now? 83/100 Tony. |