4 out of 5

Label: self-released?  Available digitally via Bandcamp.

Producer: Jim Devese

I haven’t heard Stony Sleep yet, Ben Fox Smith’s band prior to Serafin, which was prior to First, but I can imagine the leaps and bounds – from thicker, a bit clumsier slams of rock and hippy lyrical themes up through the punky alterna-rock and alterna-anger (and veganism) of ‘fin, to now, First, Smith’s sloppy phrasings tuned into more interesting and opaque imagery (even if he does still like to work in names of friends, which is generally a lyric turn-off to me) and the music brewed into a much more organic bleed of rock and roll.  I love my Serafin records, but ‘Hermes’ doesn’t have any cringe-worthy moments, which sprouted up as trying too hard on Serafin’s first and as aimless energy on ‘To the Teeth,’ the tinnily produced followup.  The super quiet mastering of that second disc carries over here, but the mixing is much thicker and more effective, assisted by band members who are playing their hearts out (The Killers’ drummer who stepped in on ‘Teeth’ just came across as a session player for some reason).

Smith’s mouth-of-marbles singing is of course in tow, but again, it feels more natural, his words flowing along at a casual slacker pace, shaping into understandable punctuations when needed.  The middle of the short album experiences a couple moments of filler, standard three-chord affairs, but I note I’ve already got these songs filed away as sing-alongable with the rest of the disc, so filler or not, they group is doing something right to key in on memorable licks.  It’s a fairly simple formula of post-rock staccato riffing that breaks to a quiet bridge and then a loud conclusion, but the group comes out strong and bold at almost every moment (importantly for the first few tracks and last few tracks), and a confident presentation is what makes the difference sometimes between the music sticking and just being good.

I was down with the out and out anger of ‘No Push Collide,’ produced to ear bleeding awesome by Dave Sardy, and I’ll still put it on for a spin.  But First. by peeling back some more layers and finding some maturity, has stumbled across an improved version of the formula that results, womp, in a fresher and more youthful sound that the band can call their own.