I don’t know if you’ve ever sat on a disabled platform at a big festival, but its shit. The staff do their best, and the view isn’t bad, generally. But if you’re like me and you like to explore different things, different styles of music, then its rubbish. Generally, you have to sit there in your spot and stay there, mostly, if you want to get back on for the main act.
A couple of years ago I was at one, and watching some absolutely terrible support and in between their songs I could hear the visceral punk rock, delivered with a real passion and emotion from the tent 50 yards away. I knew where I wanted to be. I wanted to be where the excitement was.
I wanted to be watching Frank Iero And The Future Violents.
It was them, having fun, across the way, and “Heaven Is A Place, This Is A Place” is a decent summation of what I heard, sort of, that night.
Intended to be a companion piece to the 2019 album “Barriers”, “…Place” also appears to be the end of this particular solo endeavour too. The reason you can tell that is this, really, is more than an EP.
You can, if you like just enjoy the EP – split up into two sides. Side A the anger, Side B the reflection, as it were – as a piece of music, and there is much here for you too.
But that wouldn’t be to give it its full credit and to diminish its power. “Violence”, is a song he’s been hinting at for a while and here, in full, the desperation comes through. The groove thumps too, and this is made for those type of gigs.
“Sewer Wolf” was the first single, the video was on the site, and there is something unhinged here. “I am one of the great cliches” he screams, as if finding some real pain, and there is a spiral here, a descent into something unpleasant yet completely compelling.
The cover of “Losing My Religion” is interesting too. For one thing, it is a song that took a special meaning for Iero as he recovered from a near fatal accident, but for another, he makes it sound truly fragile. Much of the credit for that must go to Kayleigh Goldsworthy who provides superb vocals throughout.
The last one, “Record Ender” – almost perfect modern alt rock, think a really widescreen Gaslight Anthem jamming with Biffy – seems to be setting itself up as the full-stop. “Maybe we fooled them all, least I hope we did,” he sings at one point – and with that he’s off to the sunset, and no doubt to something else compelling.
As with each of his solo incarnations, Frank Iero compels here, and if this Future Violents is in the past, its gone out in a blaze of glory.
Rating 8.5/10
