The sun is setting. It’s like a memory. You’re standing on a hillside, with a paper aeroplane. With all your might, you throw it. The plane takes flight, it drifts and sails on the breeze, but it doesn’t exactly soar. Do you have another throw, or do you let the sun set? This is what Summer Wars are asking themselves. Their new EP ‘Closer Than It Seems’ is their first release in six years, a comeback of sorts. It’s hoping to soar.
Arriving at the end of summer, the EP captures the sense of fading sunlight and days closing in. In keeping with their 2018 ‘Borrowed Time’ EP and their biggest song ‘End Of An Era’, these four tracks are about looking back. While the lyrics explore seasons, endings and literally seeing things in ‘The rearview’ what gives them this feel is the tone.
Close your eyes and listen to the music. There’s something familiar about the sound, perhaps a little too familiar. It’s not just the comfort of memory, it’s also the curse of genre. Ultimately though, it’s about choices. Imagine making that paper plane. Each carefully chosen line and fold makes changes its trajectory of flight. The band knows this, they know how to make their songs fly, yet everything, from the melodies, to the drum beats, to the guitar licks driving ‘Stuck In This Moment’ is recognisably pop-punk. This leads to a sound consistent with bands like The Story So Far, State Champs, Roam and so many others. You can even hear it in the genre-specific production choices like the slow, echoy drum fades on ‘Long Gone’, which you’ll recognise as those on the opening of Blink 182’s ‘Feeling This’ – those kinds of choices. It sounds ‘good’ rather than inspired.
Singer, Tripp Rowe has a distinctive style but, amusingly, it’s distinctive in the same way as many other pop punk singers, for example the ‘Oo’ sounds pronounced as ‘ew’ or how ‘gun’ becomes ‘gone’ on ‘Victim Of The Suburbs’. This gives it the comfort of familiarity. Indeed, it’s amusing that ‘Blink Of An Eye’ contains the refrain ‘I’ve got new ideas’ when the presentation harks backward. However, the EP is about the past and nostalgia, and with that, it fits.
Despite looking backwards, what they’re selling is confidence and competence, and the EP bristles with both. The music is energetic, without being too rowdy, and brushed with the honesty of emo. It’s hard not to get caught up in the delightful swing and sway of ‘Stuck In This Moment’ or stop/start singing parts of ‘Blink Of An Eye’ but the final song ‘Long Gone’ is striking. It becomes a gallop during its second half, changing the tone entirely. It’s like they’re actively moving on, and that’s a great place to leave it.
‘Closer Than It Seems’ is carefully crafted but weighted by the past. It’s a solid, enjoyable slice of pop-punk that captures the sound of a fading summer.
IAN KENWORTHY
