Pacer
No. 1
Chunksaah Records
4/10
The debut release from Pacer, the loud, melodic up and coming punk band from London, England, could very well be the soundtrack to some teenage boys’ Saturday night, cruising around in search of something good.
The seven songs on No. 1 sound a lot like the Bouncing Souls crossed with Municipal Waste – outspoken and aggressive, though melodic and with words to sing to. Though there isn’t a song on the album that exceeds three minutes, the aggression and grating quality of singer/guitarist Robert Wilson’s voice draws out the songs – making you wish some tracks would just end already. Things start to blur together after only a few songs, the lyrics becoming unmemorable and indistinguishable.
It isn’t an easy listen, but it isn’t terribly complex either. Simply put, kids are going to listen to this album when they’ve got a lot of anger and nothing to take it out on. They’re going to listen to it in the car, thrashing their heads around it at intersections on the way to a late-night high school party. Some bands are meant to be heard in a grunge-y punk-rock club, with a couple hundred kids jumping around and throwing themselves against anything in proximity, and maybe that’s the kind of band Pacer is cut out to be right now. Can they extend their sound and push themselves farther to play the big shows?
-Sydney Christie