You, Me, And Everyone We Know – Dogged EP

It’s fair to say that life has been challenging for Ben Liebsch, the mastermind behind Washington DC pop punk band You, Me and Everyone Know. Five years ago, the band seemed to be on the brink of mainstream success when alcohol abuse and mental illness led to the band’s demise, but now Liebsch, 4 years sober and back with the band have released the Dogged EP, featuring 6 new tracks.

Raise Them Bones is anthemic pop punk at its best – a sub 1 minute rage fuelled rant which works on so many levels. A really great way to kick off the EP and much better than mundane instrumentals (have I mentioned lately how much I hate instrumentals?) that so often seem to employed as album introductions. It is followed up with Does it amaze thee?, classic pop punk in the vein of All Time Low or Simple Plan. The verses are pretty killer with an acoustic intro leading to heavier riffs and although the vocals are a bit on the nasal side, they work much better here than in the chorus which seems to be trying too hard and sound like it has been auto-tuned to hell.

I’d Rather Be Sleeping & Eat My Hands are both decent enough, but for one simple reason I found the latter pretty excruciating. They have this way of using backing vocals to interject and sound a bit funny, except it just comes across as irritating. Take the lyric ‘I’ve been trying to grow, I’m on my third rotation, but if I get cut down again, they add a deliberate backing vocal of ‘Timber’ which is both annoying and unnecessary. It’s a shame as the sentiment of the song is fantastic but there is a slight sarcastic tone that attempts (but thankfully ultimately fails to) undermine it completely.

Brooks Was Here is easily the standout track, a sad, yet familiar story of the meaninglessness of life, the music is simple, but catchy as hell, and for once the band just let their obvious songwriting and storytelling skills shine through. Sadly the aforementioned irritating use of backing vocals also appears here, but still can’t dampen my enthusiasm for the song.

The EP is wrapped up with a simple acoustic track in A Pleasant Bummer, another melancholic tale of  life’s travails and its’ effect on you as your grow old. I just wish they didn’t enunciate every word so deliberately as it actually takes away from the quite interesting stories that You, Me, and Everyone We Know are capable of telling.