Review: Story of the Year – The Black Swan

Story of the Year – The Black Swan
A Review By: Paul G. Atkinson IV

The words of President Bush distantly echo, “We’ve made good progress, slowly but surely achieving our objective…” right before The Black Swan kicks in with an infuriated scream of “Liar!”

After a three year wait since the band’s last release, Story of the Year have come back with an album that suits the best of both worlds musically.  Their debut, Page Avenue, is often regarded as the band’s best work among fans.  Their second album, In The Wake of Determination, was a great departure from their debut, shedding many of the catchy choruses and emo/screamo influenced song structures and content, for a heavier and grittier sound much more akin to hardcore.

Stetson Idol – A View From The Counter Culture

Stetson Idol – A View From The Counter Culture
By: Paul G. Atkinson IV

“There are no miracles today.”
– Kevin Devine

Rather than partaking in the mind numbing (and mind erasing) parade of old men called Alumni Weekend, I was at the Stetson Idol finals April 4.

Upon finally motivating myself to be entertained, I removed myself from my fraternity house and showed up fashionably late. Since I have an apathetic view towards pop music and have a tin ear, I employed a team of experts to elicit their opinions on the artists performing at this magnificent event.

The Rock Show

Following my interview with Four Year Strong on February 24th, I entered Jacksonville’s Freebird Live just in time to see a local band take the stage with the full force of a solid, road-tested band. After a few songs they introduced themselves as Look Alive before jumping into another fast paced, genre-bridging song. It seems a lot of local underground rock bands these days feel content copying the sound of signed rock bands (hoping a similar record label might pick them up) instead of developing their own personality through their songs. Though Look Alive wasn’t an awe-inspiring source of endless originality, they certainly kept the show interesting.

Four Year Strong: Band Profile

Four Year Strong: Band Profile
By: Paul G. Atkinson IV
I had a chance to catch up with a few of the guys from Four Year Strong on their ongoing tour with Bayside, Straylight Run, The Status, and Look Alive. Dan O’Connor (guitar/vocals) and Alan Day (guitar/vocals) talked about everything from the coming summer’s Warped Tour and new songs to downloading music and being straight edge. Here’s a glimpse of what they had to say.

One of the main questions on my mind was simply “Beards?” Every member of Four Year Strong sports a substantial beard, with some that would give any lumberjack a run for his money.

“We all like beards” Dan said, though “It’s not a gimmick” he asserted, it was just easier not to shave on the road. Now it’s turned into a joke, they even make their tour manager grow a beard.

Lifestyles Of The Hip And Nameless

Lifestyles of the Hip and Nameless
By: Paul G. Atkinson IV

Underground rock culture today is consumed by more than choppy hair, studded belts, tight pants, and the occasional ‘guyliner,’ there is a distinct lifestyle that follows the hippest hipsters and trendiest trend-setters. Some people might have heard of veganism and some might have heard of the straight edge movement, but few know that many popular underground rock bands endorse combinations of both of the above. Screamo/emo-core/post-hardcore – whatever you want to classify them as – band Silverstein consists of five members, all of which are either vegan or vegetarian, with two of them being straight edge. A.F.I.’s lead vocalist Davey Havok is both vegan and straight edge.

Thirteen Albums…

The Best of 2007.
By: Paul Atkinson & Ryan Napier

Now that the year 2008 is under way there’s been time enough to reflect on the mountains of music that 2007 brought to the ears of many. After weeding out the utterly horrible the best albums of last year have been narrowed down into a handful, thirteen albums:

-Against Me! – New Wave (Punk Rock)
Although diehard fans claimed that Against Me! sold out by signing to Sire, these Gainesville punks did the most anti-establishment thing possible: made a great album that redefined their sound without giving a shit what anyone thought about them.
Key Tracks: “Thrash Unreal,” “White People for Peace”

Album Review: Coheed And Cambria’s Good Apollo, I’m Burning Star IV, Volume Two: No World For Tomorrow

Album Review: Coheed And Cambria’s
Good Apollo, I’m Burning Star IV, Volume Two: No World For Tomorrow

By: Paul G. Atkinson IV

Read on Stetson’s The Reporter online edition Here!

Coheed And Cambria’s new album – Good Apollo, I’m Burning Star IV, Volume Two: No World For Tomorrow – was the talk of many hardcore fans of the band, and despite the album reaching number six on the Billboard 200, it seemed to slip under the radar of most everyone else. That’s why I’m taking the time to go back to October 23, when the album was released, and inform you of just what you are missing. In fact this is just the first of a handful of last years missed albums I’ll be serving up, because they deserve a listen, but mostly because nothing good has come of 2008 just yet.

The album continues the bizarre extended concept and story that has run through every Coheed album since the bands conception. A quirky science-fiction creation story that is intriguing, confusing, and easily ignorable. Since anyone could spend years reading into the story and know almost nothing about it, I’m going to stick strictly to reviewing the music on Coheed’s latest release.

The Chums Of Chance - My Band, Writing & Recording…

 It all started when word of Phi Sigma Kappa’s open mic night at Stetson university met my (Paul Atkinson, the drummer of this musical endeavor) ears. I’d been playing drums for 6 or 7 or maybe more years and wanted to get something besides a ska band together. Luckily a good friend of mine, Ryan Napier, had spent his summer learning the working of the bass guitar. After we jammed a few times Mike Riggs informed myself and Napier that he had been playing guitar for 9 or so years and would be more than happy to accompany us on our journey to the open mic night extravaganza.

After a few half-ass practices and a debate over which songs to play, we came to convince Alex “X-treme” Bitner to sing for us. Open mic night came, we ended up playing a cover of Weezer’s “Undone (The Sweater Song)” as well as a cover of Brand New’s “Seventy Times 7″ before the cops shut us down. They didn’t stop our adventure though, we closed the event, playing inside, pushed up against the wall, surrounded by 40 to maybe a 100 people, I’d like to think it was thousands. We annihilated the audience’s ears with a gruelingly fast cover of Blink-182’s “Family Reunion” right into an even faster version of “Dammit.”

Time passed, Bitner said he didn’t want to do vocals anymore, and another buddy of all of ours, Joe ” Jo-Ma” Martino, gladly said he’d be our rhythm guitarist. We continued to jam, but things weren’t regular, finals were afoot. Now the semester’s over, we’ve got nearly a month to solidify. Myself, Ryan Napier, and Mike Riggs are all at my house, cutting a demo, writing original songs, making progress. Riggs is doing the rhythm guitar as Jo-Ma couldn’t make it down, and my little bro, Steve-o, is doing vocals. Demos will be cycling through the page, instrumentals at first, full songs to follow shortly, ENJOY!!!

www.myspace.com/thechumsofchance

A Quick Lesson In Concert Etiquette

A Quick Lesson In Concert Etiquette
Read on Stetson’s online edition of The Reporter Here!

Not too long ago, right here on Stetson’s campus (where I’m writing from), I was lucky enough to see Copeland and Cartel for free. As satisfied as I was with the band’s performances, I was less than satisfied with some (a lot) of the audience members. So here, I present to you some standard guidelines for attending a rock concert, keep them in mind next time, please!

1. Never Wear A T-Shirt From The Band You Have Come To See:
I can see that you like the band by the way you’re shouting the chorus out of key. In fact everyone at the concert probably likes the band, that’s why they’ve attended the show. The only thing worse than wearing one of the performers’ shirts to the show is when you’ve purchased the shirt at the concert and put it on over your current t-shirt. By all means support the band by buying merch, but show some decency.

Anberlin & Motion City Soundtrack - Halloween Show

I recently attended the Metro Station, Anberlin, Mae, and Motion City Soundtrack tour that’s going on, and it happened to be on the night of All Hallows Eve …Halloween. Here are some photos a fellow Stetson Reporter staff member took, capturing Anberlin as a 80’s biker band, and ‘Gotham’ City Soundtrack as Batman charecters:

CLICK HERE

Mae appeared as the Beatles, but sadly no pictures got them in thier Abbey Road-era regalia.

Go catch the tour.