Trash The Dress

Empty Basements

Written by: PP on 19/12/2013 22:47:35

Some say plagiarism is the sincerest form of flattery, and that is certainly the case on "Empty Basements", the debut album by Trash The Dress from Indiana, who have absolutely no problem in cloning everything there is to know about The Wonder Years in general. The poignant album title, the broken suburbia imagery depicted on the artwork, song titles like "My Best Days" and "Empty Basements", the emotionally charged croon, the melancholically ringing pop punk guitars with slightly more complex riffs than is the norm for the genre.... yeah, this is pretty much identical to The Wonder Years in every way imaginable.

The big difference? Songwriting talent. Whereas songs by The Wonder Years are tales of despair and overcoming minimum wage life in suburban America, Trash The Dress always feel like they're one or two steps behind not just lyrically, but also in terms of the melodies, the riffs, the vocal hooks, and well, pretty much everything. Does that make them a bad band? Not necessarily. "Eyelids" and "Delorean 88" are both good examples of catchy emotional pop punk of exactly the kind that is in right now, and lead single "Gut Check" is a good enough song to warrant some attention. It's just that when you base your entire band on another band, the compare/contrast effect is exceptionally strong, and it's clear here that Trash The Dress are losing that battle. We could look at another similar band, namely Real Friends, but this is a band that reinvented the sound by splurging on emotion by going overboard massively in their lyrical context.

It's difficult to find anything else to say about Trash The Dress, simply because it's so hard to shake off the feeling that they're a clone band to the very core definition of that word. The good news is that they still write pretty good songs, and I'm pretty sure their heart is in the right place and this isn't intentional... but wow. Just wow.

Download: Eyelids, Delorean 88, Awkward Phase
For the fans of: The Wonder Years, Real Friends, With The Punches
Listen: Facebook

Release date 25.06.2013
Capeside Records

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