Chin Up, Kid – “Chin Up, Kid” (Standby Records)
It’s only been a few months, but Chin Up, Kid has grown,
matured and evolved since they dropped their pop-punk opus Swing With Your Eyes Closed a few short months ago. Their eponymous
sophomore record cannot be classified as just pop-punk; it’s clearly so much
more.
While they have obviously not forgotten their roots
(“Corners,” “Growing Apart,” “Give and Take” and “Eye for An Eye” all offer up
bouncy rhythms, crunchy riffs and punchy melodies), Chin Up, Kid is anything but paint-by-numbers (“One Love” is a
brooding monster dripping with emotion, “Nothing Left To Lose” is a complex
offering that resembles A Thousand Suns era
Linkin Park, “Drop Dead Over You” is a banger with Top 40 appeal thanks to some
wonderful vocals from Liz Mauritz, closer “When I’m Gone” is about as
post-hardcore as post-hardcore gets). Chin Up, Kid continues the turbulent wave
of venomous bars from Swing With Your
Eyes Closed’s “Your Fault, Not Mine” on “Wasted,” picking themselves up off
the mat and stitching together their broken hearts via one of the better
written hooks you’ll hear anytime soon (‘I’m holding onto a fucked up past
life, been wasting days with you, take me back to a better day where I never
had a clue, I left my heart in a city and I swear I never want it back, you
think you’re one in a million but I heard you ain’t worth shit’).
If you enjoyed Swing
With Your Eyes Closed and thought Chin Up, Kid was merely a pop-punk band,
think again.
Go Download: “Wasted”
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