The Appreciation Post – Brighter Side

A little less than a year ago moogs and sythns were becoming the norm, and every new band were trying them out. Many of those bands have faded out or when onto something else; however, there still are a fair few bands who continue to bring the moog to every show and into the studio. Boston’s The Appreciation Post is one of those bands. Forming in 2005, the band self-released a heavily electronic self-titled EP soon afterwards. After touring on the release, the band headed back into the studio to record another moog-heavy release, Brighter Sides.

While there’s definitetly similiarities between Brighter Sides and Motion City Soundtrack‘s Commit This To Memory, The Appreciation Post have added a few other influences into the mix too. The chant along section in Don’t Give Up just screams out Max Bemis and Say Anything and the vocals are much deeper than anything Justin Pierre could deliver. Instead they tread in the footsteps of other more recent pop-punk/pop-emo acts on Fearless and Hopeless Records and merge the moog sensibilities of acts like Zolof The Rock’n’Roll Destroyer with distorted geek rock that Weezer fans love.

Oddly enough, the thing that probably hurts the album the most is the lack of poppiness in it. The moog melodies give it a bit of a jump, but the rest isn’t as catchy as it could, and should, be. Instead the album tends to be a bit darker than you’d expect it to be. When you hear the incredibly sythn-heavy start tp Staying In’s Alright you think you’ll get a poppy, energetic, fun song like The Epoxies but instead get a much darker, slower and mellower track that fails to live up to the excitement.

Not the most original output nor the most exciting, but Brighter Sides is a promising record from a young band still trying to refine their style. They’ve improved comparatively to their self-titled effort and have made each song more unique in the mix. Although, by doing that, they have lost some of the energetic poppiness that filled up their debut. Once they find a middle grownd, with tracks that are unique but still energetic, then they will finally have an record worthy of your time.