Justin Courtney Pierre – In The Drink

I’ll be the first to admit, I was a little heartbroken when Motion City Soundtrack packed it in and called it a day.  Over their almost twenty year career, the band came to define a particular under represented niche at the crossroads of power-pop and pop-punk, always on the cusp of breaking into the mainstream while remaining an underground staple.  It took some mourning, but I had finally come to peace with this new MCS-less reality – and then frontman Justin Courtney Pierre decided to jump back in as a soloist, opening freshly healed wounds and reminding me once again of my fondness for the group.

Not to imply that Pierre’s solo material is identical to MCS, but his debut solo effort definitely draws upon a career’s worth of experience.  Entitled In The Drink, the album is an impressive and expectedly catchy outing with all of the markers of Pierre’s musicianship.  There’s tight, crisp vocals, synthy soundboard driven melody, and the choruses are always singable. But as is clear with opener “Undone,” the tempo has been scaled back for what might be termed a more cautious, mature sound running through most tracks.  Its fresh while sounding familiar, with Pierre’s songwriting still generating memorable one liners like, “taco Tuesday, someone yelled at me, and the whole thing came undone” in the track’s unfolding narrative. “Moonbeam” feels similarly subdued, while closer “Goodnight Hiroyuko” embeds layers of shoegaze laden  static and reverb to a slowing tempo. Those that remember Pierre’s lesser known side project, Farewell Continental, will feel right at home amidst this concoction.  

But none of this is to imply that In The Drink isn’t an uplifting musical experience.  “Anchor” is lyrically hopeful and sonically smooth, “I’m A Liar” reaches for a hook driven chorus line that permeates honest lyrics like, “I’m a liar, I should tell the truth when I’m with you,” and “Ready Player One” is just quick, catchy and guitar-driven goodness.  Every track plays off of one another in a way that only experience can achieve, and that MCS fans have come to expect over the years.

There aren’t really any negatives to In The Drink.  Justin Courtney Pierre lives on beyond MCS’ breakup, meaning fans get more of the synth-driven guitar pop they’ve come to expect but that they may have thought wouldn’t come.  While the songs mark a slightly more intimate evolution in Pierre’s songwriting, his fanbase is likely well into their 30’s at this point, making such evolution a natural jumping off point.  All of these factors considered, Into The Drink is the album fans had thought would never come in a post-Motion City Soundtrack world.