Rumbletowne (2015)
Divers weren't a band on my radar until they ended up on a Snuffy Smiles 7". I had liked what I heard enough to grab their LP from last year as well. It's ended up being something of a mixed bag as there are songs that I like and others that just kind of bore me.
I will say this, when Divers are playing their faster songs they really hit that sweet spot between Tom Petty and Bruce Springsteen. Rootsy and earnest, but still having enough pop hooks and rock and roll chops to keep things from ending up in a weird Americana place. Songs like "Blood Song" and "Tracks" are true standouts and are really fantastic. If Hello Hello was full of songs like this, I would probably be much more enthusiastic about this record as a whole than I've ended up being.
My main issue is that there are far too many slow songs. These slower ones just don't have the energy and passion that the band shows when they speed up the tempo a bit. Large swaths of this record are taken up by slow, meandering guitar, barely there vocals and gentle drumming. A song or two like this would be a fine change of pace, but when they end up being the majority of your record, things get a bit dull.
Still, the highs on this record are pretty darn high and there aren't really any bad songs, just a few too many that are a bit boring to me. It's probably worth picking up if you see it, but I wouldn't go too far out of my way to hunt it down.
Divers - Hello Hello:
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