THERE'S ALWAYS A FUCKING PROBLEM

The fact that this album was recreated from bits and pieces of tracks P/S had after their laptops were stolen from them is? perhaps even demoralizing to the reader at first. It was pretty shocking to me that P/S manage to serve not only a good album considering the circumstances, but a great album which surprises with its consistency. Greg Murphy and Scott Baker's remarkable songwriting skills along with their noteworthy mastery of "amateurish" programs such as Garageband only help to show what ridiculous amounts of potential this band has.

I've known P/S for a couple of years now. I discovered them on the forums following Greg's advertisements of the band. I became an instant fan and me and Greg and I have voiced my fanboyism to Greg straightaway, which has led to a most beautiful virtual relationship which is worthy of its own romantic novel. Since that first contact P/S has managed to release another excellent EP and a few tracks but this album manages to bring a very satisfying punch quantity and quality wise. 22 mostly short tracks that jump schizophrenically from pretty semi-acoustic moments to full blown 8-bit mathy proggy pop rock. Yeah I really don't know what that even means. It's a wholly special sound which is lifted to incredible heights with Greg's composition skills. The tracks are usually terrifyingly complex and ridiculously catchy. There are tunes here that float all over the place- on the walls, under the carpet, and straight in your face, sticking to the side of your brain for weeks on end and accompanying even my stupidest everyday tasks. It is P/S's radically different sound and melodic touch which make me excited to hear anything new they have to offer.

What we have here is an impressive achievement. The sonic spectrum on this album is endlessly interesting to listen to. There is no drummer here but they manage to re-create a drummer fantastically using basic programming. The synths and weird effects are floating around here many times sounding like a bizarre horrifying 8-bit video game, the acoustic guitars have an almost indie rock flavor to them, while the electric guitars and Scott's dramatic vocals bring a whiff of metal. You can hear it from the pretty pianos in the beginning to the absolute joy of the seven "AP tracks" which capture an adventure in a video- game world and are so absolutely delightful and just plain fun- it's really just an entertaining album with a lot of depth to it. If anything, please listen to AP3- the melody has been stuck in my head for weeks and the layers of 8-bit synths is just freaking cool. Also "Pyro Cyclone Dancing the Weathervane Waltz" is a jaw dropper- the breath-taking crescendo is probably the awesomest moment on the album.

I have heard few bands who have managed to differentiate themselves from today's alternative underground dirty crazy old music scene of these days and still have such a grip on whatever pushes the emotions button in my brain. This album by any means shouldn't be good considering the really bummer consequences that lead to the way it was made, but it just is.

Give it a damn shot, it's on their bandcamp, eh?

P.S.: Look out, this album does probably contain the pun of the century. You'll know it when you hear it.