Action
Action
An Army of Shapes Between Wars
Victory Records, January 2006
Offensive words: 5
Genre: pop rock/electronica/new wave
With fifty thousand records sold of their debut album, Don‘t Cut Your Fabric to This Year’s Fashion, ink in publications like New York Newsday, Alternative Press, and Outburn and extensive touring, Action Action is ready for a second helping. They recently completed work on their sophomore release, An Army of Shapes Between Wars for Victory Records; the new album hits stores on January 24th, 2006. The band formed in 2004 from the ashes of The Reunion Show, Count The Stars and Diffuser. The chemistry between its’ members was immediately apparent – they were soon in the studio recording their debut album, released September 14, 2004 to raves from the likes of Long Island Press, who described it as, “…a dark, moody, melodic voyage into a world of buzzing ‘80s electronica and chainsaw guitars…”
Music
There is no way I am going to give a good or accurate description of
these guys so here is my best solution...take the beatles, the cure,
talking heads and an Atari 2600 video game collection, let is soak in the
sun and then place in your cd player. "Smoke and Mirrors"
kicks off the track like a 80's pop dance number full of keyboards and
synth effects. It is a fun start to a very original cd. "Oh My
Dear It's Just Chemial Frustration" gets a tad more dark but is still
like an 80's new wave track. Unique blends during the verses come
together in catchy pop laden choruses. The cd continues with a couple more
very new wave pop filled 80's style tracks with "Sleep
Paralysis" ending with a really cool key/synth video game effect from
the 80's collection. "The Game" is where the album takes a turn
in direction and sounds like a mix of garage rock meets the later years of
The Beatles. The album continues to go all over the place with a very fast
and harder new wave style song, hard crashing cymbals and almost like a
dash of old school Weezer or Foo Fighters. "What Temperature Does Air
Freeze At?" sounds like a very trippy modernized version of
"Strawberry Fields Forever." "Analogue" picks up the
pace and aggression and has an industrial feel. As you can tell the album
is all over the board. Fnas of hardcore or metal not find this
appealing but you have an eclectic attraction then you will love the
creativity.
Lyrically/Vocally
Lyrically, the album is all over the place as well with many dark
overtones. I would classify it as more dark wave in style with
several metaphors of cutting and violence. The album deals a lot
with self-doubt and a more universal approach to life and love.
Lines such as " I am
your church, your science, your imaginary savior" and "God’s
dead, and all bets have waived their rights" tend to show a different
direction in religious philosophy than my own. The album brings you face
to face with drug problems and the like and show the dark side with
imagery there as well. There are some positive overtones but in
general this is a darker focus than I really enjoy. Vocally, the style is
also very unique with a deeper tone but held with good melodies and
pitch. Very unique and it seemed to grow on me.
Not really my style musically but I can appreciate it but the overall dark images and tone is really what leads me to take a pass on this one as a Christian.