A split EP featuring All American Radio and Somerset, Instruments/Landscapes offers us a glimpse into the emotive side of the heartland. The first element of note about this disc is the packaging—a cover booklet with a creative and attractive window pane design presenting views of farm equipment and buildings, and opening up in the middle to hand out elegantly simple lyric cards with countryside photography. Very cool. Play the disc and you are welcomed into the serene world of All American Radio, a foursome that utilizes some blissful female vocals and a lot of off-key, trepidatious male vocals. Sonically, they seem like a mix between Spooky Tuesday and 5,000 Fed—rock beats, emo/indie rock guitars, and passionate wails. While they do not give us anything groundbreaking with this, their first release, they do show a lot of promise, especially in their arrangements and instrumental variety. Good tunes for heavy thinking and whatnot.
Somerset takes a bit more conventional approach to the emotive form, coupling Mid Carson July/Grey AM vocals with tempo progressions and startling interludes that shimmer and jangle. Raw indie-rock, built to encapsulate and exhort guttural emotional response, their offering is, again, nothing groundbreaking, but worth the experience. Props for the refined vocal layering and believable character—a definite, mature Neil Young quality is often present, and more props for scary dissonant string banging and scraping in The Arm They Took. Strong compositions, honest emoting, interesting lyrics, but I would recommend some more effort be put into the songwriting ingenuity department. Overall, an enjoyable debut from both bands and worth checking out.
Other coverage for this album
Decapolis 1999Reviewed by ConradAll American Radio is very emo. Nothing really stood out that much to me other than that it was pretty decent when they weren't playing slow songs. But enough of that, lets move on to Somerset - emo-pop. Much of their songs are instrument-heavy, but in their case it's a good thing because their music is wonderful. It's not all weird chords and crap, it's melody. Thank you. The vocals are very emo…Decapolis 1999Reviewed by Tom BastianThis CD is kind of interesting in that one of the bands (All American Radio) is fairly new to the scene with this split being their first CD release, while the other band (Somerset) has just recently called it quits with this being their last CD. Like the bio says, both bands are from the Lancaster, PA, area so I have had the opportunity to see both bands live a few times. All American Radio kind…Decapolis 1999Reviewed by TimThis is your standard emoish Burnt Toast Vinyl release. Somerset has good changes in the middle of the songs, but the quiet parts are too quiet and boring. All American Radio is also a standard emo band. Both of the bands kinda sound the same, so the record runs together...but if I remember correctly, All American Radio was the poppier of the two. CDecapolis 1999Reviewed by Matt R.It was almost inevitable that this CD would not be released until after Somerset played their final show, and since it is now a posthumous CD, it is very appropriate that it be a split with a newer band that is busting out in a major way all over this record. All-American Radio's side starts off on the mellow side of things and builds up with each song to a grand finale where the emotion just…Decapolis 1999Reviewed by Matt AThis is a solid release from two bands that show a lot of promise. I enjoyed All American Radio's part of the CD more than Somerset's. Their songs are a bit poppier and at times remind me of Rainer Maria (it's probably the male/female vocals). Unfortunately, this is Somerset's last release. The last song is a really good one. Anyone who's seen them play this song live will remember it. It's very…Similar sounding releases
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