Boatrocker-Antagonize

Self-Release/Independent
2014

I've got the great site Stereokiller to thank for this one. And up front I'm just going to admit that I plan to cheat as far as the release date goes on this one. Technically-speaking it was released at the tail end of 2013. Or at least digitally. With CD copies just becoming available earlier this month though I can sneak a release like "Antagonize" right passed the cut of line and we'll just pretend that it came out in 2014. That means I can add it to my 2014 best off list. Booyah! Still, I'm getting a fair bit ahead of myself here so let's rewind the tape shall we? Self-described as a "bunch of dorks playing bad music" (although their Facebook page actually states the opposite, which is way more closer to the truth, with "We are great") Boatrocker is a 4-piece band (Chris, John, Sean, Will) from Wilmington, Delaware whose style could best be described as post-hardcore. But, then again, the band, which, prior to this 7-track thing of beauty, released a 2009 demo ("Turn it The Fuck Up") and one other full-length album (2011's "Delicious Jams" which features one of the best album covers I've seen in a L-O-N-G time!), adds in these different elements/ingredients so they are a bit more then just merely "post-hardcore". Whew, that was more then a mouthful. Especially as all I had planned to serve up was the notion that the cool-named Boatrocker turn-up to 11 their overall potential appeal thanks to some timely-placed heavy metal and pop-punk elements! The Stereokiller "suggestion" was New Jersey's Thursday which I can sort of see. Other names have been tossed out as well, but it's more of the same "take this band (x, y or z) and then add these bands (more x, y and z pieces & parts)" when all that really needs to be said is that Boatrocker, whether they are trying their hand at the various nuances that made up late nineties alternative music or attempting to crush your skull with (early 2000') hardcore riffs which have been miraculously raised from the dead through some mystical source (Radiation? Voodoo? A Strange glowing comet?), rocks to the beat of their own drummer and that said beat is deliciously divine!

http://boatrocker.bandcamp.com/