Once upon a time, in the lands of emo past, Brand New’s lead vocalist Jesse Lacey played bass for Taking Back Sunday. Following Lacey’s departure, the two bands took radically different directions – but, had both parties remained united, Transit’s ‘Young New England’ might have been the result. Following on from 2011’s well-recieved ‘Listen & Forgive’, Transit’s third full-length continues to chart their progress from a straight-up pop-punk act (guitarist Tim Landers now has Misser as an outlet for this side) to an emo-tinged indie rock forcemajeure.
The record starts off in very high spirits, with lead-off single and opener ‘Nothing Lasts Forever’; hailing the start of the album with the sound of a needle coming down on a record, the song brings in chiming guitars, sumptuous vocal harmonies and a nagging, insistent riff, the type that can ring around your head for days on end. It’s followed up by ‘Second To Right’ which starts to show the TBS/BN influence on this album, with a sound caught somewhere in-between ‘Where You Want To Be’ and ‘Your Favourite Weapon’, with thick basslines and rhythms packed with groove at play under a catchy, punchy chorus.
It’s a shame then, that after such a strong beginning, this album doesn’t seem to go anywhere much at all. It’s not without its strengths – ‘Weathered Souls’ should provide an incendiary live sing-along, and ‘Don’t Go, Don’t Stray’/’Summer, ME’ sound like the sort of songs that may have been offered up to ‘Listen & Forgive’ guest star Patrick Stump, with a sound akin to his recently reformed outfit Fall Out Boy. However, tracks like ‘Hang It Up’ and ‘Thanks For Nothing’ are naught more than directionless filler, ‘Hazy’ is an overtly saccharine attempt at a “pop” single that sounds out-of-place and disingenuous, and curtain-closer ‘Lake Q’ plods along and eventually sputters out of life completely.
This is guaranteed to be a very divisive record – while it consolidates their change in tack, it fails to move further forward by being solid yet unspectacular. Transit have already proved their worth beyond being another “Defend Pop-Punk” band, but here they’ve failed to stake their claim ahead of the chasing pack by stagnating. In a direct parallel from Hostage Calm’s ‘Please Remain Calm’, which took a huge leap from a familiar style to something completely unexpected and unconventional & sounded fantastic for it, ‘Young New England’ finds Transit taking a stride forward, but crucially and to its detriment, going two steps back.
OLLIE CONNORS