Finally! The Dopamines, Full Of Fancy, and the Dead Mechanical/Full Of Fancy split 7"s are here! Also, the second press of The Steinways "Gorilla Marketing" LP is now for sale as well. The first 100 are on white vinyl. For a limited time you can buy all three 7"s in a pack for $8 and the Team Stray and the two Steinways CDs are all $5 each.

I now have a standard shipping rate of $3 no matter the size of the order. If you order by March 7 you may or may not get a specialized note from the one and only Matt Lame!

Buy here!

Along with the upcoming Dopamines and Full of Fancy 7"s, Cold Feet will also be releasing a Dead Mechanical / Full of Fancy split 7". All three 7"s will be released at the same time at some point this winter. The second pressing of The Steinways "Gorilla Marketing" LP should also be released around that time. The first 100 are on white vinyl. Woooooooo!

I posted a new song by The Dopamines called "Structural Failure". This will be on their upcoming 7" titled "Soap and Lampshades". Expect to see this by the end of the year.

Full of Fancy will be recording a 7" titled "Every Wall In The Parlor" in late October. Hopefully this will be out by the end of the year, but more than likely early 2009.

STEINWAYS, THE: Gorilla Marketing: CD
The Steinways are funny, for two reasons. The first is literally speaking, as every time I see them I'm usually cracking up by the end of their set. The other is when their first full length came out a while back, it had some really great pop punk songs on it, in between a bunch of songs that were basically three chords, one quick lyric, and done in about five seconds. Since then, it felt like a bunch of people gave them shit, saying "Yer songs are good! Keep writing songs longer then like, five seconds!" and so this time around the quick songs are gone (they're all at least a minute now), and it feels much more consistent. Musically speaking, it's not too different, as they remain a band who's clearly heavily influenced by all the classic Lookout!, Mutant Pop, and so forth trademark pop punk, but without just being another (insert-another-band-here)-core rip off. It helps that there's a very Off With Their Heads-esque "I'm broke/hate my life right now" theme to a bunch of the songs, as well as the fact that they don't take anything TOO seriously (including taking what would normally be some bands throwaway/"jokey" song like "Sweatpants", and making it a legitimately fucking great song). In hindsight, it's getting to the point where reading this will take longer than listening to the a-side, so I'll just end with this; The "I've got a five dollar bill and a coupon for two/lets go to Boston Market so I can show you how much I love you" line fucking KILLS me every time. Awesome. –Joe Evans III

TEAM STRAY: Gender Studies: CD
I'd heard this band mentioned amongst some friends of mine, and could've sworn what I heard was straight forward pop punk, heavy on the whooooa's, so that's what I figured this would be like. Instead, it's a hair-faster than mid-tempo power pop, kind of in the vein of The Plus Ones or Weezer (especially in the vocals at times) that's a bit rougher around the edges. It's not bad, and I'd probably pull it out on a cloudy day. –Joe Evans III

 

Yeah, so this album is finally out. You can either order from the Cold Feet web site or order from this here myspace page. First 100 LP orders on white/gold mix vinyl. There is also a contest up on Interpunk if you want to register to win a bunch of merch including the way out of print Tour Edition.



Team Stray CD coming soon!!!!!!!

The good news keeps coming. The Steinways "Gorilla Marketing" is at the plant getting pressed. We should hopefully have all the CDs and LPs ready to go in 3-4 weeks. Big thanks goes out to Adam Alive over at It's Alive Records. If it weren't for him we'd probably still be waiting on artwork.

Keep your eyes out on Interpunk for a Steinways contest that'll probably be up in a month or so. If you missed out on one of the Tour Editions you'll have a chance to win one here! It's a joint contest with It's Alive Records so there will be a lot of awesome stuff to win.

The new Team Stray album "Gender Studies" should also hopefully be out by the end of the month as well. Surprisingly we're just waiting on the artwork!

It's hard to talk about a band maturing without making it sound like they've gotten boring or stale. Usually it's a term reserved for a band getting old and losing a bit of their edge. Because of this, I was hesitant to use the word at all in describing this record, but it's the most fitting thing to say. The Steinways have taken the sound they've been developing over the course of the last album and few 7"s and matured into what I'm hearing on Gorilla Marketing. The last releases have all been great, but this LP feels like they've fully realized their sound. The band has gotten a little older (as Grath acknowledges in one of the first lyrics) and a little more self-effacing, but hasn't lost any of what makes them fun and funny.

There's no drastic change in sound, more of a natural progression from the Peabodys split and pizza 7". It's the Steinways doing what they've been doing all along, only better in every way. The instrumentation is tighter, the drum fills are better, the harmonies are more fleshed out and more frequent, and the songwriting is a step above anything else they've released. Some of these songs have been staples of their live set for quite a while now, and it's great to finally have a studio recording to listen to (especially "Oh My Fucking Gosh"). Even the songs I've been familiar with from shows have some extra touches here and there that make them feel new. The band stretches outside of their usual style of pop-punk on a handful of songs, most notably "Oh Angela" and "Nobody Wants To Make Out With Me Because I Wear Sweatpants." The former is slower and more downbeat than expected, while the latter is almost new wave with its sequenced drums and 80s sounding guitar lead. Rather than stick out as sore thumbs, though, they fit in remarkably well. Adding some more variety, guitarist Ace sings lead on 2 songs and bassist Michelle takes the mic on the majority of "It's My Hair." All 3 songwriters' styles fit together incredibly well to make a well-rounded but still consistent record.

The record's sequencing is key in maintaining a balance between the more standard Steinways style songs and the ones that stretch out a bit. The band takes full advantage of the inherent similarity in the sound of pop punk songs to tie the whole thing together. Familiar rhythms keep everything flowing in a way that accentuates both the individual songs' strength and the cohesiveness of the whole LP. Whereas the last album had a number of references to outside bands and influences, this one makes great use of self-referential melodies and lyrics to poke some fun at the slightly more serious tone of the album. Not to mention the fact that it gives the whole thing an even stronger sense of consistency. The lyrics are, at times, both more serious and more ridiculous than before, sometimes in songs that are placed back to back on the record ("Half Baked Heartache"/"Manhattan Boots"). "CGI", the second to last track and last one with vocals, seems to sum up the whole record, building to a perfect finale where Grath declares "nothing will ever really be the same" before shifting into a short, country-tinged instrumental to finish side B. It's as if they chose the song to end the record on a more down, world-weary note than it started, and also to hammer home the last lyric of the preceding song.

More important than anything else, though, is that the record manages to do all this and is still this much fun to listen to. The Steinways have come a long way, and they've managed to pretty much do everything right on this release. It comes out in June on Cold Feet Records, if you're a fan of the old stuff or curious about one of the best new pop punk bands around, definitely pick this up.

---joethebone, Centerfuse.net

The Steinways album has been titled "Gorilla Marketing" and the plan is to officially release it in late June at the Insubordination Fest in Baltimore, MD. However, they will have "Tour Edition" LPs on their upcoming tour with Dear Landlord. These will be limited to 100 and will more than likely look like shit. Hooray!