Reviews

Virginia’s Race The Sun hit all the right notes on their debut record: hooky pop melodies, technical guitar work, and one of the most distinctive voices to come out lately.  The eleven tracks bristle with everything that made Can’t Slow Down era Saves The Day and Nothing Gold Can Stay era A New Found Glory so guiltily irresistible; the knowledge that such great vocal harmonies and tuneful music could, no, definitely will be co-opted by the masses and the attention that will soon be fostered upon them.  It’s only a matter of time before Race The Sun is selling millions of copies and their time on New Jersey’s Fidelity Records is but a happy memory.
 
For the most part Race The Sun stick to their heavy guitars, pausing sometimes to incorporate tres moderne elements like keyboards and vocal distortion in their pristinely produced LP.  Race The Sun, for all their reminders of late nineties pop-punk, are not trapped by the past, nor limited to the usual High School lyrical topics.  The terrific opener “Solo Tonight” lushly revels in the dawn, asking “are you with me tonight witnessing this moving painting?”  They also have a great travel song “My Heart, The Compass (Points West), which ranks right up there with the best sing alongs to put on, blast, and just drive.  The song “Can’t Wait,” has such a simple, memorable chorus it seems improbable that the epic outro to the song will top it; but it does.
 
If you still hold a place in your heart for the pop-punk band you used to sing along to on the bus to school, or the band you listened to while you contemplated a kiss then you need to get this.  Light, almost fluffy, euphoria will flood your body, making you as weightless as the translucent paper used in the gorgeous CD booklet. When RTS sings “say goodbye to yesterday.” and the voices continue but the music fades out to just the A Capella harmonies. problems, worries, troubles all melt away. Get this tonight, love it the rest of your life.  At the very least, I guarantee you’ll like it more than that Race The Sun flick with Halle Berry.  That movie sucked.