Album Review: Century Thirteen – Self Titled

Since their formation in 2014 Century Thirteen have been hard at work, aided by a strong DIY work ethic the quartet have already released four EPs, and have built a steady fanbase throughout Scotland which has been fuelled by a series of high octane and energetic live performances, including numerous charity events and shows for such causes as cancer research, metal health awareness and autism. Century Thirteen are now set to unleash their thirteen track, self titled, self released debut full length on Friday 13th July.

After a brief introduction Century Thirteen get things into gear with Get Off, a slice of raw pop punk, this is immediately followed by the ragged bounce of Is It Just Me. The album continues in this vein until the mid way point when there is an abrupt switch of style in the shape of two tracks, Ours and The Last, that carry a much heavier fuzz laden and aggressive feel, for me these two tracks lift the album out of the rut it was in danger of getting stuck in. The album then returns to it’s pop punk theme, but Century Thirteen throw you one further curve ball in the shape of a somewhat incongruous orchestral version of the album’s opening track, Get Off

This is an album that is informed by the sounds of the band’s youth, you can hear the influence from the likes of Blink-182, New Found Glory and Green Day. The band’s debut full length is something of a surprise, whilst this is unquestionably influenced by pop punk it eschews the usual polished production in favour of a more ragged live approach. I’m normally an advocate of a raw feel to recordings and I’m not a fan of overproduced studio albums, but there has to be a balance somewhere as Century Thirteen‘s debut is sadly let down by having the feel of a demo recording that’s in need of a final polish, something that masks the promise that the material on their debut album undoubtably possesses.

Century Thirteen‘s Bandcamp can be found here and their Facebook page is here