The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus – Don’t You Fake It

In today’s overcrowded pool of new music and new bands, it is sometimes hard to make a splash and stand out as a new band. That’s why you need a hook to grab the listener’s attention immediately, before they even hear the music. Imagine for a second walking down a CD aisle in your favorite store, looking for a new band – the things that jump out are you are either A) great artwork B) a random promotional sticker slapped across the front or C) an innovative and memorable name. The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus have that memorable name to grab the passer-by’s attention. Right there, the band has a foot in the door, and the instant you throw in Don’t You Fake It you have a comforting feeling of familiarity – which both hurts and helps the album at times.

The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus are attempting to jump into an already overcrowded pool of forgettable pop-punk/emo bands. Arriving a little too late to make a giant splash, but strong enough to make a ripple. It’s an album you feel you’ve heard a million times before thanks to labels like Victory or Warcon with a tinge of the Triple Crown flock.

Still, it seems as if Red Jumpsuit Apparatus knows that the pool is getting crowded, so on top of the necessary screams and the melodic yet hard hitting guitar riffs that is so important in today’s platinum-selling albums, they are able to put enough of an unique spin in their songs to make the listener keep coming back to it. Even if it’s only for a few songs at a time. There’s the slow, piano-driven ballard Cat And Mouse along with the moving, acousticGuardian Angel to slow the album down a bit, showing that Ronnie Winter is able to do more than one thing with his voice. After all, they are a big leap from the heavy Silverstein-like Atrophy and In Fate’s Hands. Still, Face Down takes the perfect ten on the album with a tense beat, keyboard melody, and the best hook on the album in the chorus “Do you feel like a man, when you push her around? / Do you feel better now, as she falls to the ground?”

Don’t You Fake It is a promising, if albeit slightly predictable album. The biggest fault in the album is just that they were a little late in jumping into the pool. What would’ve been held as innovative and creative a few years ago is now just generic and repetitive; still, the Florida natives have made an album that is able to ripple the waters and if the emo trend continues for a few more years and the band hones their writing skill, I’m sure their follow up will be making a splash to remember.