ome time ago, I trekked up to Frederick, MD to play a show with many other bands. During the last set of the night, a friendly guy approached me and began to talk with me about the show and other general topics. Mid sentence, I realized that he was in one of the bands (Vida Blue) that played this evening and commented on their proficiency. When our conversation was finished, I mentally noted that never in the few years of show-going I have racked up, not once has anyone approached me, much less a member of a rather popular touring band. Yeah, I felt pretty cool. (*). Later on that evening, I came across their first full length while scanning the merchandise table. I quickly coerced my band mate out of ten dollars and was the proud owner of “Our Miracle Point Of Contact”.


The Vida Blue's little things add something almost charming to their music. The stops that seem off time, the guitars that sound off key and drums that begin a song and stop fifteen seconds into it only to begin again- all moved from the assumed annoying flaws and inconsistencies to funny and purposeful bits of musical humor. The guitars sound a bit fuller on this recording than their latest full length, ‘The Comprehensive List’, giving the band overall a less ‘garagey’ feel, which works as well in this case as the more trebly sound they have adopted.


The only complaints I have with this album are: 1) the vocals are too loud in the mix for my taste. But then, I tend to prefer vocals that are background to music opposed to the opposite. 2) The drums tend to sound a bit weak. But both are minor in comparison with the dynamic they present.


I’ve found that I enjoy this album entirely too much to write an objective review of it. This is emotional hardcore (‘as if hardcore isn’t emotional to begin with’ to paraphrase Palatka) that is far above average.


((*)- Sarcasm. It simply seemed to me that Matt from the Vida Blue was a terribly nice guy. There is some sort of unwritten division between band and audience, some hidden rule that prohibits any kind of conversation or communication of thoughts and ideas between (higher) band and (lower) crowd. We all, obviously, are standing here, waiting to be entertained...anything the band has to say is unimportant. It is the ‘shut up and play mentality’. We obviously didn’t pay a door fee to hear you ramble on, we just want our rock. We want it now.)