Record Review: Those Hounds "AM03"

$10 //
https://thosehounds.bandcamp.com/album/am03 //

While some might say "Oh, you don't have that many records", I like to think of my small collection as being more of a selective group of what I feel are the best of the best but also best experienced on vinyl because of their sound as well.   This is my first time seeing a 10" record though and I don't know if that's weird or not but I showed my Dad a 7" the other day and he didn't seem to know that they made the records now that weren't like the old 45's where you needed the adapter thing.

Right away, Those Hounds come out swinging with complicated rock music.   Somewhere between the wild side of Christiansen and the darkness of Deftones this first song gets into some screaming like Foo Fighters (or Nirvana) as well.   There are heavily distorted parts and it goes back and forth between the clean melodies and distortion stomp, sort of like a heavier version of Jimmy Eat World I guess you could say.   I can't quite put my finger on what this reminds me of exactly but it has elements of The Beautiful Mistake and P.O.D.

While the song can grow more melodic it also can just as easily bring out screaming and singing together, but not in that hardcore or metal way, more in a heavy rock sort of way.    There are lots of starts and stops before some ooooh's and this one comes to an end.   It seems only fitting that the last line in the song is also "This is what it's like to feel the end", which you can take any number of different ways (Death, a break up, graduation, quitting drugs, divorce, etc.)

Both of these songs are on the same side and "Collider", which is the second of the two, opens with these great scratching sounds within the rock music and I've never heard something like this before so when you hear it you will also likely go "Yeah, that is different but I like it".   It reminds me a bit of Far and then this big bass beat just comes in as it grinds, driving faster and harder.     While both of these songs can feel like somewhat post rock the fact still remains that they are both complex.   Big beats like lasers of doom fired to destroy entire worlds is how this ends and there are screams tucked away there in the background.

In my experience, there has been two different kinds of music as it relates to how I think about Those Hounds.   Some bands choose to make songs which are around three or four minutes in length and then they have maybe twelve or so songs and call it an album.   Other bands can put together fewer songs but they increase their length to five or six minutes- sometimes more- and it has a fuller album sound with less tracks.  (See: My recent review of Scraps of Tape to witness how less can be more)

Those Hounds have created a third option.  Songs which aren't too long nor too short but have enough changes and depth to make them feel like albums in and of themselves.   Some people might look at this and think two songs makes it a single, one song on each side, you know.   But when you actually listen to it, when you actually crank it up loud enough to feel that bass pulsate in your entire body, your entire being... You'll come to realize this isn't two songs-- it's two sides to an album.   It might not make sense to you but Those Hounds are out to make you believers.