Relient K

Relient K
Five Score & Seven Years Ago


Five Score & Seven Years Ago, Relient K's fifth release in their nine-year career, is the manifestation of everything they have recorded thus far, reaching higher heights and pulling from deeper depths. While 2004's MMHMM found the Ohio-based outfit breaking out of their Christian rock stereotype with bigger choruses and a wider horizon, the songs on their latest are more undeniably catchy and earnest than ever before.

Never ones to sacrifice melody for a message, Relient K seem to have an endless well of creativity when it comes to sharp hooks, memorable refrains and well-written lyrics. "Come Right Out And Say It" beats Panic! At the Disco at their own game, scream-worthy chorus and whatnot. Another notable chorus (amongst many) is in "Devastation and Reform," when the assertive guitar figure in the verses (nicked from Red Hot Chili Peppers' "Can't Stop") drop out and go all traditional-pop-punk in favor for a mountain of a chorus that states the following:

I feel like I was born
To devastation and reform
Destroying everything I loved
And the worst part is
I pull my heart out, reconstruct
And in the end it's nothing but
The shell of what I had when I first started

If that isn't an emotional punch in the face I don't know what is!