Royal Chant – ‘Raise Your Glass & Collapse’ | Album Review

Review: Billy Geary

– Raise Your Glass & Collapse – Royal Chant

Garage rock is nothing new in music, particularly in Australia, with bands such as British India and Jet playing it successfully for years. Due to its nature, bands don’t have a lot to work with when it comes to writing and playing garage and punk influenced music. Thus, more often that not a band’s success comes down to the energy found on the recordings and in live shows.

Despite being quite an enjoyable release, the downfall of Raise Your Glass & Collapse is that it is by no means ground breaking or original. This however, is not a problem as Royal Chant’s debut has energy by the bucket load which more than makes up for the inevitable lack of originality.

The record does have some great moments with tracks such as ‘[other]’ and closer ‘Sea Chanty’ proving to be the better cuts off the album. In particular, ‘Sea Chanty’ transition from a nice, mellow rock song to a big, mean and nasty punk number makes for great listening. Throughout, Mark Spence’s vocals are a dead ringer for Gallows front man Frank Carter, which can only be a good thing as Gallows are arguably the best punk band going around at the moment.

Clocking in at a mere 34 minutes, the band’s debut is over quite quickly, which only leaves the listener wanting more. However, despite the album’s running time, there is still quite a bit to be enjoyed here. First single ‘Ghosts’ sees the four piece tap into their more indie influences, resulting in somewhat as the black sheep of the album. Tracks like opener ‘Hey Hey’ and ‘Coughing Fits’ are fairly indicative of the albums main trend – Kings of Leon styled stadium rock with a punk twist. Fans of the aforementioned bands will vastly enjoy this release, as it is garage rock done very well.

It is when Royal Chant turn the distortion notch up a few levels that the band really hits their stride. Album highlight ‘Syndrome’ is the giant fuck you that the album desperately needed to get the band out of second gear. Furious snare hits and jolting guitars provide the perfect backdrop for Spence to shout that ‘It’s easier to love what you hate.’ It is obvious that this is where the band excels, with high energy, high distortion tracks that are made to go nuts and jump around to.

For what it is, Raise Your Glass & Collapse is an enjoyable release. Bringing to mind The Gaslight Anthem and REM, Royal Chant successfully meld punk and garage elements with straightforward melodies creating an album full of infectious and energetic rock songs. Raise Your Glass & Collapse is a promising debut filled with glimmers of a band that, given time, is capable of a lot more.

– Raise Your Glass & Collapse – Royal Chant

Review: Billy Geary

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