I Am Ghost – We Are Always Searching

Ever since bands like My Chemical Romance, Thrice, Thursday, Senses Fail, and AFI started breaking into the main stream, there has been a flood of copy cat bands playing the same carbon copy style of music. The same recycled riff and the same boring vocals tinged with scream after scream. It’s become monotonous and boring. But finally, it is Epitaph who has found a new band to follow in the footsteps of the MTV famed goth punks with I Am Ghost and their breakthrough new album We Are Always Searching.

The sextet from Long Beach have made a CD for all those copy cat bands to reach for, but we all know they wont be abel to reach the beauty that I Am Ghost has created. The eerie album kicks off with the three minute long introduction The Dead Girl Epilogue: Part One, which instantly sets the mood. Distant female vocals whisper in the background of soothing piano melodies with a steady stream of rain falling all around before it all accumulates to the explosive entrance of Pretty People Never Lie/Vampire Really Never Die and they don’t rest until the nine song EP comes to an end. Steve Juliano’s vocals are extremely strong in both singing and screaming sections, he could be compared to any of the top goth punk singers of the day. He is able to reach such a wide variety of notes that he is able to give each song a distinctive feel of their own. But it’s not just his vocals with make We are Always Searching such a find, but rather the entire sound. When Gabriel Iraheta throws in her vocals here and there you really get a feel of depth, add the use of the piano and Kerith Marcantonio violin carefully layered throughout the backbone of the song and you’re in for a treat.

I Am Ghost are set to take the entire scene by storm, and they deserve it too. They have taken a relatively worn out sound and added a new fresh spin on it, making it into an album that will be able to stand the trials of time. Even their lyrics aren’t filled with as much dribble as this genre usually comes with, the most evident of that comes from Lady Madeline In Her Coffin. It’s dark, eerie and punk, a terrific combination.