Sunday, August 16, 2009

The Opposite Sex - Live And Burn EP



Washington D.C.'s The Opposite Sex have been a favorite since I first caught them at Trash Bar in early 2007. Live And Burn is their latest EP with diverse inspirations and dynamic execution, due for official release on September 1st.





Opening the record, “Frozen Heart/Frozen Mind” crashes to the fore with the punk raucousness and nihilistic abandon of early T.S.O.L. Dennis Kane‘s riffs are sharp, classic, and cut to the bone, while Shawn Helton‘s vocals rip into the track, building from thoughtful and expository to a feverish urgency punctuated with the swampy reverberations of minimal surf guitar. “Arctic tension hides/Stalking me inside/Standing still in ice…Becoming polarized” he sings, readying us for the frosty, anxiety-ridden lyrics that haunt the rest of the album. Whether pleading, damning, railing, or contemplating, Helton is capricious to the point that the listener is always held in infinite suspense, wondering how his vocals will drive the adroit musical transformations from moment to moment.

Continued HERE at The Big Takeover.

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