Eleventyseven’s brand of catchiness originates in a crossbreed of dance, electro, punk and rock. Their comeback album – ‘Rad Science’ – released after a 3-year hiatus, combines groove with crunching chords and hands-in-the-air choruses. The band originally released their first label debut in 2005, quickly gaining notoriety on the various Sony/BMG imprints they inhabited. Their second album, ‘Galactic Conquest’, cemented them as a staple of pop rock in Asia resulting in chart success and extensive touring in Japan. After completing various other releases, Eleventyseven officially disbanded in 2014, only to re-emerge with their own label, podcast, and this their 5th, and comeback album.
‘Rad Science’ delivers an infectious group of songs, which is sure to be spinning at most dance events and will be gaining extensive radio exposure. Eleventyseven massively produced sound includes all the essential factors to guarantee radio play.
Adrenalin inducing hooks and chants, twisting synth lines, heart-pumping beats, thick bone-crushing riffs, and soaring vocals. These aspects should not only secure radio time, but also make ‘Rad Science’ a guaranteed commercial triumph. Yes there is an integral focus on getting wasted, dance floors, blurry nights, break-ups and breakdowns.
The album is sure to bring along plenty of new fans, as Eleventyseven poach audiences from emo and punk extraction and imprison them in their alternative power pop basket. The catchiness of the opening song ‘New Rock Bottom’ is incredible and the chorus is one of the best Eleventyseven have written.
But overall with a very good beat, lighting quick surrounding lines, and a great chorus this probably has to be one of the band’s best songs. The problem with that statement, is that you’ll be repeating it after each and every song, guaranteed!
This is an album that grows stronger with each passing cut. It’s like Eleventyseven elevate their confidence and push themselves further on each subsequent track. And you’ll experience that sensation as soon as the killer opening riffs set in on ‘1990 Awesome’. It also has a really good instrumental pre-chorus that leads into the anthemic chorus perfectly.
Eleventyseven are some of the cleverest alternative pop scholars currently operating in the music business today, and the hypnotic catchiness of their songs is not an accident. Not by a long shot. This band crafts more ear-worm choruses in one album than most pop bands accumulate in a lifetime.
Beneath all the hype and genre labels I’m laying down here, lies a group of incredibly well rounded musicians and students of the art form of popular music. These men know what it takes to create a potential hit song, and they prove it across 10 affecting tracks on ‘Rad Science’.
There is quirky sensibility and penchant for great melodies that make songs like ‘Holding Out’, ‘Hour Glass’, ‘Neveafter’ and ‘Wish Myself Away’, jump out and grab you by the throat, never letting go until the final note strikes.
This is an album that’s comfortable in its own shoes and is a distillation of the core elements that make up great alternative power pop songs – clever lyrical twists, amazing vocals, and great melodies – spread over a significantly wide sonic canvas. The huge pop hooks present throughout are undeniable, and they are anchored by characteristically strong verses, complete with passionate vocal performances.
Perhaps surprisingly, the emotional and musical centerpiece of the record, for me, isn’t in one of the many high-energy anthems, but in the slightly slower build of ‘Inside’, in many ways the all-round best track this band has produced since their hiatus.
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