Title: Spit At The Sun
Format Reviewed: MP3
Format Released: 9th October 2015
Reviewed By: Lee Morton
I've not come across Banquets prior to this review and I've been kicking myself all week as Spit At The Sun is their third and final album. I've definitely joined the club too late. Hailing from New Jersey and possessing the same blue collar work ethic and playing similar hearts-on-sleeves melodic punk that fellow Jersey boys The Gaslight Anthem have taken round the world to greater acclaim, this final album is the perfect swansong.
Forecaster kicks off the album and grabs you straight away with its energetic drumming and the soaring vocals that are a mainstay of the album. This is the sound of a band released from pressure, bowing out on a high. Hell, Hello follows and is a catchy, bouncy anthem about looking back at life and moving forward, which is a theme thoughout most of this record.
Stop Signs In A Ghost Town is a farewell to fans with lines like "This is the last time I try to make sense of this, this is the last song I sing" but still retains some positivity whilst Oblivion is much deeper, perhaps hinting at some reasons behind the break-up. That doesn't make it melancholic as the vocals and lead guitar ebb and flow creating a brooding undercurrent.
No Rome closes the first half of the record and lyrically is one of my favourite tracks, containing some of the best lines and some great guitar work. Piled High takes a dig at the modern world and our need for 'things', but despite some great lyrics this track kind of washed over me.
I found Backwash to be very similar too: perhaps a mid-section lull as it doesn't have the same pull of the earlier tracks. Lucky Lighter is a gentle ballad and I'm sure will get many lucky lighters raised at the farewell gigs! The vocals are high on emotion which balances against the simple, but effective, guitar strokes. The chorus, with its layered vocals, is very powerful.
To Reminisce is emo-by-numbers and despite best efforts on the chorus fails to hit the mark but this failing is more than made up by final track, I've Got A Scheme, which is driven along by some upbeat guitar play and impassioned vocals. It's a song of no regrets: "I can't change the past", but also of looking forward and to possible new chapters in the lives of the band members. The build and release on the final verse followed by the refrain "I don't remember when" may inspire goose bumps.
As I stated at the start of this I am disappointed that I've only just discovered Banquets but their final album is testament to the honesty and integrity that they bring to their music and is a fitting farewell to the fans.
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