Joyce Manor – A Million Dollars To Kill Me

California indie rock band Joyce Manor has straddled the line between simple pop-punk darlings and straight up indie-pop.  It’s been a decade and five albums since the fun loving quartet first entered the picture, and they’ve certainly carved out a curious niche for themselves.  With songs that average less than two minutes, Joyce Manor are like those fun-loving relatives that never overstay their welcome, leaving their hosts eagerly anticipating their return.  

Their fifth full length, A Million Dollars To Kill Me, treads familiar ground for Joyce Manor, but also finds the band more fully exploring their college rock undertones.  The title track is about the most predictable of the batch, whereas “I’m Not The One” strays the farthest from safety.  While the former is the most “aggressive,” even with its mid-tempo pacing, the latter lands closest to casual indie stalwarts like Guster and even Weezer.  Generally, the album plays to this calmness, stylistically taking a few steps away from the energetic pitter patter of the past.

Divergent tempo aside, the band remains highly entertaining and as fun as ever.  Tracks like “Big Lie” ebb and flow instrumentally, complemented with a lyrical slyness and vocal versatility that reminds listeners how unhinged the band can get when they let their hair down.  “Up The Punks” channels a similar energy while maintaining A Million Dollars To Kill Me’s underlying smoothness.  Even when things start to mellow out, “Gone Tomorrow’s” melancholy droning feels more like a recalibration of musicianship than a late album slumber.

The album ends with “Wildflowers,” which is perhaps the album’s most brow raising song in that the most accurate likeness is to that of Ben Folds.  While that may be a red flag for some punk rock diehards, Ben Folds has always been somewhat of a guilty pleasure of mine, so Barry Johnson taming his voice with silky smooth results is more than welcome in my books.  Even if the twinkly instrumental bridge has elements of elevator music, it’s a novel conclusion that, like everything Joyce Manor embarks upon, doesn’t overstay its welcome.

With A Million Dollars To Kill Me, Joyce Manor remains one of the indie and punk scene’s funnest players with which to invest some downtime.  There’s no denying that the album is a little subdued compared with past efforts, but that doesn’t come at the expense of the band’s playful personality and embraceable hooks.  A Million Dollars To Kill Me fits naturally with Joyce Manor’s existing body of work as yet another brief, fun little distraction penned distinctly as only the quartet knows how.