Broadway Calls / Mixtapes – Vision Quest EP

With less than a week to go before the annual punk rock party known as The Fest takes over Gainesville, it seems appropriate to be listening to Vision Quest on repeat. It’s a time to catch up on all the bands you want to see, memorize every word so that you can drunkenly sing along with them and hundreds of other fans from around the globe. Vision Quest helps kill two birds with one stones and reconnects me with two bands high up on my “must see” list next weekend: Broadway Calls and Mixtapes.

Lucky for me, it’s a pretty damn good split as well.

Oregon’s Broadway Calls kick it off with Open Letter and You Got Me, the band’s first new material that I’ve heard with their recent line-up change and first on their new label No Sleep Records. While I can’t be certain that it’s because of the line-up change, Broadway Calls seem to have a renewed sense of energy on these songs here. High energy and up-tempo, the songs serve as a throwback to the pop-punk explosion of the mid-nineties. They bring it back to the basics, making any pop-punker happy with some of the catchiest choruses they’ve delivered since their self-titled album. Especially on You Got Me– a nasally driven Dookie influenced pop-punk gem.

Ohio’s Mixtapes show up on the other side of the split and follow their impressive No Sleep Records debut, Even On The Worst Nights – and don’t you worry, these aren’t just throwaways left over from that session. Far from it, these are Mixtapes at their best.

The band’s first addition to the split comes in the three-minute gem Little Miami, a song that sees Maura Weaver take over the lead vocal duties for the entire song and never alternate with Ryan Rockwell like we’ve come so accustomed to. She handles it with confidence and delivers one of the more memorable Mixtapes songs since Nothing Can Kill The Grimace and a bridge worthy of a special mention. Puzzle Part 2 (I Don’t Believe In Ghosts) has Weaver and Rockwell trading off vocals once again showcasing the pop-punk charm we’ve come to expect from the band. A nostalgia soaked ditty with an opening bass riff that is just so very familiar it’s almost irritating, the songs ends the split perfectly – leaving you patiently waiting for more from either band.

Any pop-punk fan, or anyone heading down to Florida for The Fest, will surely find something of merit in this fantastic, four song split.