Pentimento/Young English - Split

I thought I'd take a break from the crushing metal, to cover some punk rock! This is the latest split record from Buffalo, NY punks Pentimento and Orange County's Young English. This was released around March/April time this year depending on where you were in the world at the time. I'm only getting round to this review now, as that's how jammed my inbox is!

Tracklist -

Pentimento

1. L'esprit De Escalier (The Stairs)

2. No Apology

3. To The Bridge:

4. The Places You Have Come To Fear The Most (Dashboard Confessional Cover)

Young English

5. Woke Up Under Water

6. Old Wives Tales

7. So Long, Connecticut

8. Tonight, Tonight (Smashing Pumpkins Cover)

Pentimento start things of with the song L'Esprit De Escalar (The Stairs) with distorted, crunching guitars that lead into nice melodic vocal harmonies. It kind of sounds a lot like pop-punk from the Drive-Thru era, but it has more bite about it, kinda like Hot Water Music. The vocals are a mix of gruff punk and cleanly sung pop-punk. The instrumentation bounces along with angular riffs and well placed drumming. No Apology has a more of a straightforward song structure to it and doesn’t require as much thought from the listener, but still features a sound that shy's away from the sheen of mass-produced pop-punk of recent years. Basically, it has it's own personality! There are thoughtful passages in this song too, which includes some nice guitar effects and quieter singing and it's a good texture against the punkier passages. To The Bridge brings their sound back to the gruffer, rough and ready sound that was evident in their opener. It's really good, especially when the soaring melodic vocals are heard in the mix. The instrumentation is spot on too, making the whole package pretty much perfect. They close their side of the split with a Dashboard Confessional cover, The Place You Have Come To Fear The Most. It's a subtle departure from the songs that have come before, as initially it's semi acoustic. About a minute in though Pentimento turn it on its head and their full blown sound back to the fore. It's a great way to end their side of the split and they've done the song proud.

So onto Young English's side and immediately you're greeted with a more modern take on punk. The guitars are super melodic, as are the vocals. Woke Up Under Water still has its moments and is a strong song. It showed me that I'm still a sucker for good melody and clean guitar. Old Wives Tale has a nice country music feel to it and is acoustic to begin with. It moves away to reveal a song, which has elements of Brand New (circa Deja Entendu era) in the vocals melodies. This is one of my standout tracks on this split, for that reason. It's hard, as I don't have as much to say about Young English's side of the split, but that doesn't mean I don't connect with it, as it's really listenable. What is nice is that both bands have different sounds and that's the great thing about split records. So Long, Connecticut is another pop-punk peach of a song, with plenty of heart and soul. The music doesn't seem forced or fake and much like the rest of this split, is well produced, well written and just good music. Young English's closer is an interesting choice. It's a cover of Tonight, Tonight by The Smashing Pumpkins. They've been bold in a way, by covering a song by band that play a different genre of rock, but have managed to make it sound their own song. It's a good way to round out this split and has cheered me up hugely!

This split was released by Panic Records and has been made available to stream and buy form their Bandcamp page below:-

You can keep up to date with what both Pentimento and Young English are doing on Facebook at http://www.facebook.com/PentimentoNY and http://www.facebook.com/YoungEnglishBand.