Album of the Week: Here’s To The Fatigue by Press to MECO
This week’s Album of the Week poll was won by Press to MECO. URY Music’s Jed Fulwell, a big PtM fan, reviews their sophomore record.
Press to MECO are a young, fantastically energetic band, with influences listed on their Facebook page — very believably — as “Everything”. Ironically, when finding someone to compare them to, I drew a blank. The act have a truly unique pop-mathcore sound that rings through even more on their sophomore album.
The album begins with a deep, thudding intro, gradually building into the band’s latest single ‘Familiar Ground’. What’s most obvious from the opening to the LP is how much the bands production has improved to become clear, tight and punchy — other bands should take note. Press to MECO continue to work wonders with their vocal harmonies whilst the lyrics, and despite being a bit more mainstream in sound, retain the interesting and marshy quality of their first LP, ‘Good Intent’.
‘Here’s To The Fatigue’, the title track, follows with a more frantic sound which epitomises the group’s ability to blend the heavy and the happy, achieved even more seamlessly than in their first effort. The writing appears slightly less maths-based, with fourth track ‘If All Your Parts Don’t Make a Whole’ particularly lacking the progressive timings of their earlier music. However the song is so catchy that it’ll make for another surefire live hit.
As the album flows forwards, the bangers continue, with the fragile and acoustic ‘A Place In It All’, which opens up into an uplifting chorus, juxtaposed with ‘A Quick Fix’ and ‘Itchy Fingers’. ‘A Quick Fix’ provides a fantastic polyrhythmic breakdown for the more progressive fans, whilst ‘Itchy Fingers’ shows off the band’s light-hearted and hardcore sides, complete with a fun “Nananana nananana na” backing vocal. The album keeps its energy right to the end of the last track, ‘White Knuckling’, which features an overwhelming syncopated breakdown to finish, leaving the listener feeling pumped.
Overall, this album has everything that makes Press to MECO great — vocal harmonies sitting atop a melting pot of progressiveness, heaviness and pop — with improved writing and production fully showcasing the complete sound that the band have been making in live performances for years.
Article: Jed Fulwell
URY Music Editor: Alex West
