Daycare Swindlers

Reradiate

Written by: MAK on 28/10/2015 20:47:34

To describe a band as beige might be considered an insult, but when an album is strikingly bland and you can’t wait for it just finish, the signs aren’t promising. Punk veterans Daycare Swindlers seem to be having a bit of a midlife crisis with their latest album “Reradiate”, their first full-length release since 2004.

Musically and topically the songs on “Reradiate” are not captivating apart from the fact a few of the early tracks get annoyingly repetitive, like the sort of pop song that you don’t want stuck in your head but it lingers there for days. The instantly noticeable things about these topics are that you can’t tell if Daycare Swindlers have decided to grow up or not. The opening song is the standard song about a girl, it even tells you in the title and about a billion times in the chorus, it seems like a reminiscent tale of recapturing their youthful days in high school and being in their teens. The follow up “Telephone” makes the Virginia punks sound like bitter old men that hate the idea of so many people being reliant on their phones and technology. Make up your minds, are you down with the kids? Or just grumpy old men?

The overall tone for the album is full of generic, happy sounding pop-punk/punk-rock style riffs and beats with catchy hooks. Only a few tracks out of the sixteen vary from this formula. “Bad Luck” and “It’s Alive” push more in the direction of funky ska-punk, while “Nebula” breaks the mould as a stand-alone aggressive track with rough, shouty vocals and extremely distorted riffs. These few songs are certainly the more enjoyable ones. Having never heard of the sextet before this album, I decided to do my homework and check their back catalogue in the process. I discovered that “Reradiate” is a far-cry from the music Daycare Swindlers were creating a decade ago, previous albums like “This Is No Way To Make A Living” and “Heathen Radio” actually had some real grit, energy and a pure skate-punk attitude to them. Those earlier albums are far more enjoyable listens and I finally understand why they might have been for fans of Leftover Crack. They are not anymore.

Thinking outside of my own distaste for this album, I can’t help feeling that there is an attraction to mainstream pop-rock culture here and that several of these songs could do well in the charts, Especially "Telephone". Lyrically there is a lot of simplicity and the tedious catchiness that would sit well with most of the mainstream following. “Reradiate” is a safe album for background music and not much more, I certainly won’t be purposely listening to this album again unless I need to zone out and not pay attention to anything. The album is simple and nice, but not very effective. I don't think it will be the comeback that most fans will be expecting

5

Download: Telephone, Nebula, Bad Luck
For The Fans Of: The Interrupters, Citizen Fish, Millencolin
Listen: facebook.com

Release date 16.10.2015
Say-10 Records

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