Montroze and Their Forthcoming ‘Escape’.
Montroze – Bristol, England, United Kingdom.
Photography credit: Isha Shah Photography – Click Here.
For our previous work on the band – Click Here.
The Bristol based Montroze are nothing but consistent. The band regularly tour, release music with healthy gaps and certifiably put their all into a sound well their own. Escape is the follow up to 2015’s Monster Under The Bed and if you have been lucky enough to hear it early or just newer songs at shows, you’ll know this is the sound of a Pop-Punk band that is so much more than that description.
Escape is set to release mid-September with the band self-describing it as both their best and an attempt at honing their arguably already really well honed sound. ‘Escaping’ is very much classic Montroze flirting with a harder and more mature sound. Thick Alternative Rock charged mid-tempo Pop-Punk is very much the band’s forte and but with the added punchier guitars and a strain you don’t often hear from Jason Bishop’s voice is more than welcome even if you do wish for more than you get. Greed maybe?
You can get through this is the message and here’s a motivational photo to hammer that point home.
‘Shameful You’ is a rockier Montroze taking their Pop-Rock sensibilities to the limelight once more. The band tease you again with playful guitar work and perfectly contrastingly backing vocals and distanced half-screams that mark the track as one of their absolute best. Again, the only real criticism is that you’re on the edge of your seat lovingly annoyed at the band for such a short ploy.
‘Contemplation’ emotionally wears its heart on its melodic little sleeve in a well layered semi-acoustic number that really quite suits Montroze, in a way that if this was all you knew of them, you’d accept and expect them in this vein. If you’re a fan of the some of the more acoustic-led tracks from The Wonder Years, then ‘Contemplation’ will very much stand as a highlight within the context of this release and in general.
‘A Breath’ is very much short rest-bite where more of what has become the signature string-work from the band does its best to introduce the Montroze-stamped Pop-Punk sing-a-long that is ‘Pages Of Different Book’.
Montroze in this stage of their career have an ubiquitous strength and have taken all that was so notable about their previous EP and refined it. The band have always had their own mature sound that resonates enough with the arguably less-mature by nature Pop-Punk scene while standing out enough to lead it. ‘Pages Of A Different Book’ very much captures this before the story of ‘Escaping’ is seen in a different light in ‘Escaping II’.
Escape is the third EP from Montroze and I like many are still wishing for that full-length but with that said, Escape is more than good enough to tide you over.
#StayFresh
