By: Alyssa Rashbaum
The Red Tree, Moneen’s third album, finds the Toronto-based foursome delivering outrageously emotive visceral rock neatly packaged in song titles like “If Tragedy’s Appealing, Then Disaster’s an Addiction” (listen) and “There Are a Million Reasons for Why This May Not Work…And Just One Good One for Why It Will.”
Like an oversensitive teen feebly trying to channel his angst into aggression, Moneen explode from the opening notes of “Don’t Ever Tell Locke What He Can’t Do” (yes, Lost fans, that is a reference to the show) and slowly burn themselves out as the album progresses. They hang on tightly to their tried-and-true formula of melodic verse/explosive chorus/harmonic bridge and by the end, we’re chest-deep in ballad territory. On the final track, “The Song I Swore to Never Sing,” frontman Kenny Bridges sings, “Give me space, I’ll give you me / In time we’ll sort this out.”
A band this hypersensitive is bound to have internal squabbles, and Moneen’s were painstakingly documented in the film, The Start to This May Be the End to Another, filmed during the initial stages of putting together The Red Tree.
Now past that precarious stage, they haven’t completely sorted out their individual emotional issues, but at least they’ve found a good outlet for them.
Moneen tour dates:
4/13, Tulsa, OK (Cain’s Ballroom) 4/14, Lawrence, KS (Granada Theater)4/15, Minneapolis, MN (Triple Rock Social Club)4/17, Omaha, NE (Sokol Auditorium)4/18, Denver, CO (Cervantes)4/19, Salt Lake City, UT (In the Venue)4/21, Portland, OR (Roseland Theater)4/22, Seattle, WA (El Corazon)4/23, Vancouver, BC (Croatian Cultural Center)4/24, Edmonton, AB (Red’s)4/25, Calgary, AB (MacEwan Hall)4/27, Winnipeg, MB (Ramada Theater)4/30, Toronto, ON (Kool Haus)5/1, Ottawa, ON (Capitol Music Hall)5/2, Montreal, QC (Spectrum)5/4, Portland, ME (State Theater)5/5, Burlington, VT (Higher Ground)5/6, Hartford, CT (Webster Theater)5/7, East Rutherford, NJ (Bamboozle @ Meadowlands)5/11, London, ON (Call the Office)5/12, Burlington, VT (The Music Center)5/14, Guelph, ON (E-Bar)5/17, Kingston, ON (The Grad Club)5/18, Waterloo, ON (The Starlight Lounge)
