Our Last Night - The Ghosts Among Us

Band: Our Last Night
Album: The Ghosts Among Us
Genre: Hardcore/Metal
Label: Epitaph

Tracks:
1. Symptoms of a Failing System
2. Timing Is Everything
3. Running The Clocks
4. Recovery
5. Escape
6. Dreamcatcher
7. Forecasting
8. Surviving Disasters
9. This is Your Lifesaver
10. I Have Fought A Measureless Battler
11. The Messenger

Our Last night is a group of small town heroes who are the new fresh faces of the hardcore/metal sub-genre that bands like Underoath and Silverstein dwell in. Well, at least that's what Epitaph basically informed me via a sticker on the case of the album. This old trick is great because for young music buyers, it's all about drawing relationships between consumers and this new group and bands they know and/or love. Label have been using it for years, but to those of us who've been around the block, we have learned not ever slant banged boy sounds like Taking Back Sunday. So with this experience, I will admit even knowing the label felt the need for such an ad, I felt cautious about the band's debut, "The Ghosts Amongst Us," but then I thought, "o, let's just see what they bring to the table."

My aforementioned caution was quickly tossed aside as Ghosts began to spin and the Our Last Night brought their guns to the table. "Symptoms of a Falling System," the opener, opens with a showcase of front man Trevor Wentworth's amazing abilities on the mic as well as Matt Wentworth's good backup lines. The brothers have a chemistry that plays throughout the album much like Tegan and Sara, where one's talent on compliments the other. The album has tales of love and calls to fight, and though this ground has been walked hundreds of times, the technicality and approach Our Last Night brings makes it seem more fresh than other recent pop ups in the music world. On, "Running The Clocks, Trevor discusses the ideas of controlling our fate to some degree with the lines, "the stars were bright before we got here/but our choices sent them into the darkness." Pretty deep for a band trying to rise up. However, they did mention stars, and they are on the list of hip things in the "scene" at the moment [along with: love, hearts, robots, aliens, guns, knives, lust, flowers]. However, since the musicianship that Our Last Night displays is so good, I don't think I can hold it against them too much. I mean, you have to move units some how and no one wants a bunch of tales about things they aren't interested in. The closer for Ghosts, "The Messenger," plays like a big encore should. The band is ferocious and the lyrics hit hard and loud. The band does mention failing lungs and that just seems like an excuse to seem deep and hurt, but alas, the music is too good to turn me away.

Our Last Night does not need a sticker promoting their small town roots or similar sounding bands. All they need is someone to hear, "The Ghosts Among Us," and they will be on the road to fame, or at least a hot topic on message boards and a few nice wall pieces in your local Hot Topic. Though the album does little to break new ground, Our Last Night play with heart and technicality that I think deserves attention. Go pick up, "The Ghosts Among Us," or at least swing by the myspace page for the band, you'll know why I said to do so about thirty seconds into whichever you desire to hear.

GRADE: 8/10