Death & Taxes is Brandtson's follow-up to the full-length Dial In Sounds release from early last year. On this outing the band goes more into the area of straight ahead rock and roll, while not straying far from the musical roots that have made previous releases succeed.
The album's six songs flow together into a cohesive collection of feel good indie rock music that should work well for summer driving. However, the words "feel good" and "indie rock" are ones that generally don't mix too well and it will be interesting to see how the band's fan base may shift a bit as a result of this release.
Most likely, the "feel good" aspect comes from the rather light-hearted lyrics. There are a couple of very impressive lines, but many that come off as substance-less and sometimes even cheesy. The most impressive lyric has to be from "On Three": "Don't give in to all those voices that are telling you about past failures, killing you before you've had your chance to live." "In the Pills" also has a rather personal feel: "You're so turned on by tragedy. I'm broke in two so come love me." Otherwise, the lyrics are the area that holds the album back.
Obviously, since this is an EP it's going to be short, but still the 19 minute length will leave most listeners feeling a bit unfulfilled. Death & Taxes is a decent release, but it doesn't provide quite as much to appreciate as previous albums from Brandtson. Hopefully this is just a short detour in Brandtson's journey as a band and not too representative of future material.
3 tocks
Other coverage for this album
Decapolis April 2003Reviewed by Kriss StressWhen looking back on a band's history, one can notice the most startling of evolutions. History has provided many examples, Ian MacKaye's switch from Minor Threat to Fugazi, the evolution of The Crucified into Stavesacre, etc, etc. In this case, one notices the evolution of a small time hardcore band called Six Feet Deep into a marvelous (dare I say?) emo band called Brandtson. Over the last few…Opus 2003Reviewed by Matt WindhamGuess what all you emo fans -- Brandtson is back and have finally released an album where Myk Porter sings on-key. Unbelievable, isn't it? I admit that his off-key rants on previous albums were kinda catchy, and this new Myk was a little hard to get used to, but all is well by the end of Death and Taxes. Unlike their past albums in which Brandtson did the emo thing and focused more on the music…Similar sounding releases
2003Slow Coming DayFarewell to the Familiar
2004Action ToolbeltAction Toolbelt
2002Ultimate FakebookOpen Up and Say Awesome
2005The Evan AnthemSens
2003The Jealous SoundKill Them With Kindness
2001OleanderUnwindMore from Brandtson
1997Letterbox
2004Send Us A Signal
1999Fallen Star Collection
2000Trying to Figure Each Other Out
2002Dial In Sounds
