After blasting us with jangly guitar riffs and harmonized croons on last week’s SPIN Singles Mix, Hoboken’s Stuyvesant proves on its third LP, Shmyvesant, that even with the suburban mall-ification of the Vans Warped Tour, down-to-earth, old-school pop-punk is still spry and kicking.
Comprised of former Jersey City/Hoboken ’90s band members and a local drum shop owner, Maxwell’s vets Ralph Malanga (Footstone), Sean Adams and Brian Musikoff (Friends, Romans, Countrymen), and Peter Martinez blaze through the album’s twelve tracks with three-chord vigor. Double-denim flashbacks may follow from Gin Blossoms’-esque power-pop fuzz (“Until You Came Around,” “Silent Treatment”), third-wave ska horn breaks (“3AM,” “Alright”), and Michael Stipe-esque vocals (“Grant’s Tomb”). And yes, the guys still break out the occasional shredding guitar solo.
Listen to Shmyvesant below, and purchase a copy here come November 25.
