Brightlight City - 'Our Future's Not Dead' EP Review

Tracklist:

1. It Depends On You

2. Leave A Light On

3. Heart Stops

4. Past/Future

As soon as I played the first track of Bright Light’ City's new EP; 'Our Future’s Not Dead' I had an immediate thought “my god these guys are English” and I do not mean that in a bad way at all. I personally love when a band is able to embrace their native accent into the vocals, Enter Shikari, Biffy, the list could go on but I think I’ve made my point. Moving swiftly on before I gush too much, “It Depends On You” prepares you nicely with a vocal intro and a light chugging guitar. After the build up the whole band burst in together which was awesome and got me going but then it slowed back down to the same chugging style used in the intro which initially left me feeling a bit underwhelmed. However once the chorus kicked in it all made sense, the steady verses allowed for an awesome fast paced chorus, everything about it screams Anthem. Before you know it you’ll be screaming the lines back at the band, don’t you love it when the vocalist makes the audience do the work! “Leave A Light On” slows the tempo down as the band take you on a bit of a journey exploring their more emotional side. The vocals reminded me of Jimmy Eat World a little bit in this track particularly during the verses. The backing vocals really add an extra dynamic, and I can easily see them getting stuck in my head in the very near future. When the chorus kicks in you really start to see what these lads are capable of, the lead guitar is for lack of a better word; awesome. The rhythm section is punchy and tight, everything you want in a 5 piece Rock outfit. I can already tell very soon that fans are going to recognise this song the second they hear the first guitar chug in “Heart Stops”. My honest opinion is everyone has at least one track like this, one of mine is Rise Against’s “Like The Angel” and very soon this track is going to be another. I know I’ve already dropped the A-bomb once (Anthem) but if ever there was a definition for it, these guys have wrote it with this song. The gang vocal at the beginning is such a chantable line, if it had me going along with it imagine what a crowd will do! The whole band are on point with small start stop style chugging during the verses which lends itself well to the vocals. Before everything comes together nicely toward the end with another chantable line which will leave the audience singing long after the song is finished. After everything I’d heard thus far I must say “Past/Future” was a bit of a curve ball for me, in that the opening riff started out feeling a bit more technical than the others and I loved it. The verses are catchy and build up to a particularly belting chorus which leaves you feeling dazed and a little aroused. Ok maybe it was just me that felt dazed. I enjoyed it so much I got the often used line in this song stuck in my head, which also happens to be the name of the E.P. I think this is very appropriate because if these guys keep putting out bangers like this I can confidently say their future is definitely not dead!

Ultimately I put these guys at nearly full marks, I loved almost everything about this EP for all the reasons stated above, the thing that just pulled them shy for me is the occasional build up that would lead back into a steady verse riff. For the most part this worked well but sometimes when I hear a build up I want to stay up there with the high tempo and banging riffs for a while before dropping off.