Though an ambitious debut from these Utah youngsters, there’s is just too much popular music scene culture colliding all at once. Although rooted in the post rock tones of Isis, IATO also throw in some progressive, angular rock a la modern Dillinger and The Deftones as well as some emo/screamo quirkiness for good, kid appealing measure.
The end result is a confused, undecided album that, when buried in the more post rock hues, does some nice things such as the closing of opener “Chasing Bears and Reading Scriptures”, the dramatic melodic moments of “Bet’Cha Job” or the nice climax of “Randy Wrinkled Travis”. But when taking more popular, random tangents, the album tends to collapse in on itself in a wash of scene satiating prose (“Exybit Mean Kaybadbye”, “I’m Pretty Tired and I’m Pretty Old”, “Nobody Calls Me Chicken”, “Scribble Jack”) with way too long songs and comes across a bit like Fear Before the March of Flames on barbiturates. A comparison aided by the production which was rendered by Kris Culler, who also produced FBTMOF.
My other partial issue with the album is the vocals that stay unstably clean or unconvincingly harsh (i.e. the ‘single’ –ish “Text the Sex Message”). The point is cemented by instrumental “A Going Under” which ends up being one of the albums most enjoyable tracks with its shimmering, maritime moods. The album closes with the introspective, yet whiny “Puked On and Slapped Up” which serves to solidify the album’s languid output that while littered with occasional promise, is destined to be a post rock footnote.
