The Speakeasy – The Speakeasy

This is the debut album for the Montreal’s The Speakeasy, and what a debut, I was going to kick off this rambling of words by saying Why?, why do bands the other side of the pond produce such great music, and that sometimes I wish it was only a pond separating us, that seeing such bands live could be so much easier, why do we not have bands that sound like this and make music that sounds so right, but then actually we do, and this will become clearer later on I hope.

Skate Punk is their calling card, but I’d go so far as to to say Folk Punk has a place in their description and with not a Mandolin or Banjo in sight, yet lyrically and emotionally this band make all the right noises. So here goes for my explanation of that ridiculously mad sounding first paragraph, and how the need to expand their scope in our amazing world of music is worth listening to. We kick off with an introduction that could be the best opener to an album I’ve personally heard in a long time, ‘Lights’ gives an explanation to this bands mantra so well, live for today and do what you want no matter what others say, which is followed by an uplifting song in ‘Bright Side’ which has a sound that takes me right back to the earlier comment on having music like this on my side of the pond, think Black Water County or Crazy Arm (go check em out). ‘Devil in Disguise’ is next up and this is possibly the only straight up skate punk song on the album, its got all the heavy rock guitar riffs and power drums, but still drops a lyric full of warnings and wise words.

As alluded to in earlier words, this is an album that never shys away from stretching the limits of what this band can and will do, genres are there to confine, this band don’t want that and it shows.  ‘Keep Me Where You Are’ gives a rock vibes song a hit of pop punk that livens it up to a whole other level, ‘Breakfast Drugs’ is a ballad that shows so much empathy for life’s highs and lows, it takes something so intrinsically sad and somehow gives hope.

A cover of ‘Johnny B Good’ is thrown in at three quarters of the way through, this is not only slightly unexpected, but fully understood, it shows some of the influence that brings The Speakeasy fully head and shoulders above the crowd. Finishing with two naturally different sounding tracks in ‘Tea Party’ and ‘Signs Of Spring’ is wholly not unexpected though, this is why this is such a great album by a band that have now made their mark on this world with a huge slab of life affirming chain breaking music.

You could say Sum 41, You could say NOFX, you could say Black Water County or Crazy Arm, but truth is none can be truly as free and great as this band on this album!

Out January 19th via Thousand Island Records. Stream and buy too HERE

Check out the bands Facebook for all other info and gigs.