الخميس، 25 مارس 2010

Ex Number Five: The Team Players Association

I was first exposed to Ex Number Five via the clunky yet harmless Razor Freestyle Scooter video game. Yeah, remember those Razor scooters? Every kid on the block had one back then. Despite not having anything in common whatsoever, the band gained a decent amount of public appeal from that game, and for good cause. They meant business when it came to their craft and musicianship, even down to perfecting the post-hardcore act; twin guitars lash out monstrous, melodic riffs that interchange, harmonize and play off of each other in a way that pulses as the group's lead auxiliary. Alf Bartone fronts a unique and powerful voice that gives their songs an extra injection of steroids, yet he manages to keep away from standard screamo territory. Even drummer Luke Bodenstein proved to be a vital asset with his diverse patterns and intricate fills, dropping serious onslaughts that drive each song home. The band has had a couple different bassists, but Chris Newman certainly threw in a meaty low-end on their later recordings.

Preceded by a number of demos, The Team Players Association can be considered Ex Number Five's true output of studio material. My only gripe with an otherwise solid rock album is it only includes nine tracks. "(Not) Go" was the best of the two songs featured on Razor Freestyle Scooter, yet is sorely missed on the record and would have been an excellent bookend for the band's short-lived run. They split paths sometime in 2002, although Bartone subsequently lent his vocals to a decent hardcore band called The Fire Still Burns for four years. Of course, they wound up disbanding as well. The rest of Ex Number Five branched out into several other projects, but none have come close to the creative success they had before.

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