Light Years will be releasing I Won’t Hold This Against You on June 18th via Paper + Plastick Records. A CD release in the US will also come from Black Numbers with additional releases in the UK from Banquet Records and Ice Grill$ in Japan. Pre-order the record here and stream a new song called “Nice To Know You” while checking out the artwork and track listing below!
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Mixtapes, You Blew It!, Light Years, Modern Baseball Summer Tour
*This review was composed by Justin Graci and edited by Erik van Rheenen
Ohio’s best-kept secret, Light Years, is finally starting to make their way to the top of the pop-punk scene. With the release of two great EPs over the past three years and a nonstop touring schedule the band is finally ready to release their first full length on Paper + Plastick Records this summer.
Parking Lots EP is a teaser for the full length — I Won’t Hold This Against You —and showcases two of the best Light Years songs to date. Lead single Parking Lots is a great and natural progression for the band, and shows off their 90s pop-punk style better than any of their past material. Lead singer Pat Kennedy sounds better then ever as he sings, “And now there’s nothing left to hide behind and I’ve got nothing to show / And now there’s nothing left for you and I, so I’m just letting it go.”
Light Years sounds a little heavier on the second song on the EP, “Put Myself Together.” The song has another boasting chorus and Kent Sliney’s drumming creates a great backbone for the song. The acoustic version of “Put Myself Together” is drastically different, but equally as good. Listeners won’t mind a single bit singing along to the same song right after the original.
Senior Writer Jesse Richman had the chance to catch up with Pentimento at SXSW this past March. Jesse and the band discussed SXSW, Panic Records, new music, touring, and much more. Check it all out below!
First off, can I get your names and what you do in the band?
Mike: I’m Mike and I play the drums.
Jeramiah: I’m Jeramiah; I play the guitar and sing.
Lance: I’m Lance, I play the guitar.
Vinny: I’m Vinny. I play the bass.
So this was your second show at SXSW, right? How did last night’s go?
Mike: Yes, sir. Last night was a party. It was a little overwhelming because we had never done anything like this before; the closest we’ve come is like FEST which is…
POZ: Slightly different.
Mike: A liiiittle bit different than FEST.
Jeramiah: Loading in and parking and trying to drive into the city was much different than we expected it was going to be.
Mike: Everywhere I looked it was like a circus exploded onto the city streets. It was very cool. It’s very different but a great vibe all around. We saw some incredible stuff happen right before our eyes last night. It made me feel like there was magic in the air. So it was really cool!
POZ: What did you see?
Mike: Dude, oh my God! So there’s a guy rapping on top of a van. And down the street from him there’s this little two-piece blues-y type band. So instead of competing with one another to see who could be louder, they just started jamming together. The guitar player and the drummer just started playing with his pre-recorded beats. He was rapping; everybody was dancing in the street. It was one of the coolest things ever. We met some incredible people, I met the singer from Punchline; I’ve been a Punchline fan for a long time so that was cool. I don’t know man, but like I said the vibe in downtown Austin was incredible.
Jeramiah: And we played the Weapons of Mass Creation Fest. All of the guys who run that are out of the Cleveland area. They were really great dudes with their heads in the right place.
POZ: Who else was on that bill?
Jeramiah: This band called Northern Faces was actually on it. It was our first time seeing them, from Albany. They were awesome. And Laura Stevenson also headlined for the night. There was a bunch of great bands, can’t recall the names but it was all really good artists, for sure.
Mike: And that’s the exciting thing about these showcases is that it’s like every single bill is so different and everybody just kills it. Not to put anybody down for what they do, musically, but I have not seen one band that I didn’t like. Whether it was at a showcase or just walking around and checking out what was going on. I just can’t believe the intense feeling that I get from walking around the block. I’ve seen like seven bands within my .5 mile walk that I just took. It’s crazy stuff.
Do you have a band that you’re planning on checking out while you’re here?
Jeramiah: We, unfortunately, tonight we have to go to San Antonio for a show there tomorrow and then we come back and do two shows on Saturday. So sure enough, it’s another festival that we cannot see anybody; we just have to play and drive in the van. But we’re sticking around the Top Shelf Showcase to watch all the bands tonight.
Mike: We’ve been lucky enough to roll in early because of the parking situation to see some of the other really cool bands that have been on the showcase. Today especially. Every single band that played was incredible. And it was awesome to see Candy Hearts, who we’re on tour with right now, a little bit out of their element as well, get a great response. They sounded awesome tonight. That was cool too.
How’s the tour been going so far?
Jeramiah: It’s fun. Allison Weiss and her band are awesome. I think that everyone that’s listening [reading] should listen to that band.
POZ: She’s from Brooklyn. I’m from New York, so I’ve seen her a bunch of times.
Jeramiah: The shows have been really cool. We’ve met a lot of great people and most importantly, watching the music every night has been really, really awesome. It’s been great so far. We’re in Texas and it’s snowing in Buffalo…
Monday means BandsOnBands, and we’re excited to be posting this PropertyOfZack feature today with Zack Sekuler of The Braces. The band just released a new album called Two Years, so make sure to check it out here.
In this week’s feature, Zack discusses his love for Elvis Costello. Zack, like many of us, grew up listening to punk bands, but his musical life took a bit of a influential turn when he found Elvis Costello, and the frontman had many interesting things to say about Costello. Listen to songs by Elvis Costello on Spotify here and check out what Zack had to say about one of his biggest influences below!
From Zack Sekuler of The Braces:
Growing up going to punk shows in southern California, it is really easy to see legendary bands from the LA hardcore scene of the 80’s still playing today. My first show was TSOL at a community center and from there I got into Adolescents, Agent Orange, Descendents, Circle Jerks and a few others, but the local band that hit me the hardest was Bad Religion. I listened to Bad Religion about as much as a hearing impaired person listens through their hearing aid. It was through that interest that I discovered an interview where someone in the band was asked about their favorite artist, their response being an emphatic declaration of one name “Elvis Costello”.
A few weeks later I was rummaging through my Dad’s old LP’s when I discovered Elvis Costello’s first record, “My Aim Is True”. The art itself had sold me; emblazoned in a checkerboard pattern of type in the font face ‘Serifa’ there was a cryptic message, “Elvis Is King”. Right in the middle of all of that was a picture of Elvis, a nerdy looking dude holding his guitar in a power stance. If Elvis was gonna be king, it was gonna be through his music, and that was the case. His music has a truth to it, the doo wop influenced jazzy power pop that lets reggae and proto-punk slip through stands in a league of it’s own. The lyrics tinged with refreshing honesty and insanely good cadence. Elvis Costello was singing angry break up songs long before Jawbreaker, but I feel equally as affected by both.
The Braces just released a great new album via Paper + Plastick Records called Two Years. PropertyOfZack is happy to be doing a new Track-By-Track with the band today to take fans behind the scenes of the tracks on the record. Check it out below!
Reasons Not To Hate Everything
Sometimes you need to go into your past to explain who you are and how you got that way. Being the designated benchwarmer in every sport I played was one of the main reasons I started skateboarding and listening to punk, for every reason I had to hate everything, I would find a new reason not to. This was the last song we wrote for the record, the goal was to make a song that felt cumulative of everything leading up to the two years these songs are about, that could be the introduction for the tone and mood set by the other songs on the record. I’m not talking about being 10 years old because I’m trying to reminisce about missing cartoons to sit on a bench or in the outfield. I’m talking about it because if that isn’t what happened, this record wouldn’t exist.
Applause
Maintaining friendships is hard when you feel like you constantly have to please an audience of people. I was really busy at school and I was having a hard time managing the constant work-flow with a failing relationship. I didn’t have time for anything else and a friend of mine wasn’t willing to accept that the reason I didn’t talk to them as often was because of that. It lead to an argument and eventual falling out. This song came out of all of that.
Scratches
I was listening to “…and out come the wolves” in my car and the cd was scratched so it kept skipping and looping the same part, I realized that a scratched cd was a lot like how I felt at the time. Repeating my mistakes and not learning from them. I was scratching at a scratch. I came to the conclusion that it’s better to just accept that I am who I am and whatever mistakes I make are inevitable, it is how I deal with those mistakes that makes me who I am.
Black Eye Makeup
Los Angeles is full of girls like this.
Trophies
Where we live, there are a lot of people who do nothing their whole lives and get everything handed to them. I was getting frustrated with the culture of privilege I was seeing and I was angry at my girlfriend at the time for buying into that notion.
Two Years
My girlfriend and I finally broke up on our Two Year anniversary. We had been on/off the whole time but this was the first time it felt final. I was thinking about all of the reasons we were together and the reasons we weren’t anymore. I wrote a few of the songs on our last EP that winter about an earlier time that her and I had broken up and I was trying to get her back. I didn’t want to have to do that again.
Mixtapes, You Blew It!, Light Years, Modern Baseball (6/27-7/2), and Last Call (7/16-7/21) will be hitting the road this summer. Check out the dates below by clicking “Read More!”
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Light Years Release “Parking Lots” Music Video, EP
Light Years have signed to Paper + Plastick Records and have released a new song/music video for “Parking Lots.” The band has also released a digital EP today featuring the song and another track off of their upcoming full-length, I Won’t Hold This Against You, which is due out this summer. Download the EP here and check out the “Parking Lots” music video below by clicking “Read More.”
It’s rare that we do compilations here at PropertyOfZack, but they tend to be special ones when we do. Today it’s a true pleasure to be taking the wraps off of a special charity-fueled compilation that we’ve been working on for a month or two now called The Big Comp by Big Footprints, Lame-O Records, and POZ.
Big Footprints is the marriage of musical and artistic communities around the world for the betterment of our environment. Donations will be going to The Nature Conservancy - a non-profit organization that works towards reforestation. We will also be participating in TNC’s Adopt An Acre program, where we will be adopting acres of land in The Appalachian Mountains, The Northern Rockies, The Southern Coastal Plains, as well as adopting acres of Coral Reef.
And when we say big, we mean it. For a minimum of $5 you can download 75 fantastic tracks by 75 different bands with all donations (minus Bandcamp fees) going directly to charity.
PropertyOfZack, Big Footprints, and Lame-O Records would like to thank No Sleep Records, Run For Cover Records, Topshelf records, Paper + Plastick Records Records, Pure Noise Records, Asian Man Records, Tiny Engines Records, and of course all the bands and artists involved in this great comp.
What are you waiting for? Check out the artwork and track listing and download the 75 band comp for a minimum of $5 (or more) below by clicking “Read More.”
The Braces are releasing Two Years via Paper + Plastick Records on APril 9th, and PropertyOfZack is stoked to be streaming the title track off of the record today. Pre-order Two Years here and stream the title track ;below by clicking “Read More!”
Pentimento have announced that they are pressing their debut LP via Paper + Plastick Records and Black Numbers like originally planned, despite past fallout with Panic Records. Check out details below by clicking “Read More.”
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Pentimento Release Record For Free After Panic Records Force Band Into Corner
Former PropertyOfZack Showcase artist, The Braces have signed to Paper + Plastick Records. The band will be releasing Two Years on April 9th. Check out the artwork, track listing, and a new song/music video for “Vandal” below by clicking “Read More.”
Paper + Plastick Records have lost a free digital subscription series. Check out details below by clicking “Read More.”
It looks like Pentimento and Paper + Plastick Records may finally be teaming up together this March. Check out teaser tweets from P+P below by clicking “Read More.”
Though their names and stomping grounds are some of the only prominent similarities between New York punk acts Nightmare of You and Nightmares For a Week, both bands manage to excel in their respective niches on the aptly named Nightmares Split. While Nightmare of You flaunt appropriately sultry Smiths vocals over sedative indie-pop instrumentation, Nightmares For a Week snarl intimidating hooks just behind a brick wall of 4/4 fury.
Nightmare of You’s “Box of Hops” sets the bar high for the rest of the split. Curiously quirky lyrics like, “With nowhere to go I took it to the street/And stood next to the garbage to make myself look clean” are made even more enthralling by an impressively graceful lead vocal that turns airy in just the right places. Electric guitar layered over rhythmic acoustic strumming rips a page right out of the Smiths’ book, but flawless execution makes the obvious borrowing readily excusable.
The house lights are lowered and the disco ball drops on “It’s Not Enough Until It’s Killing Me,” Nightmare of You’s final track. Sixteenth notes on the hi-hat and a shift of emphasis from acoustic strumming to seductive electric plucking combine to produce a dancey vibe that just barely scrapes the border between stylistic and over-the-top. Lyrically, however, there is no question; “Craving too much sex and dark chocolate?” Combined with retro dance club instrumentation, over-the-top is an understatement.
To be fair, the impressive precision exhibited in “Box of Hops” undeniably carries over to this track. Unfortunately, the finished product feels exaggerated and difficult to take seriously.
It only takes about three seconds for Nightmares For a Week to effectively mark their territory on the flipside of Nightmares Split. “2011” calls in an air raid from left field with beefed-out guitars, grizzly layered vocals, and a light-speed drum beat that’s ripping at the seams from rhythmic tension. A few new voices join in for a decidedly anthemic pop-punk chorus, and it’s all over by 0:57. Nightmares For a Week know exactly what they’re doing, and the confidence chiseled into their execution proves that they didn’t get this good overnight.
Broadway Calls and Red City Radio are doing a co-headlining tour with Silver Snakes. Check out the dates below by clicking “Read More.”
The Wonder Years
Greatest Generation
The Front Bottoms
Talon Of The Hawk
Man Overboard
Heart Attack
Misser
Distancing
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