June 14, 2011 • Topshelf Records
If they keep making good emo revival albums, I'm gonna keep making reviews. Of course there is the issue of quickly running out of things to say when many of these albums are pretty similar, even if they're good, so I'm not entirely sure what to say about You Can Just Leave It All aside from... well, it's another pretty good emo revival album.
So there isn't a lot to say about their sound; Prawn mixes in that modern heavy post-rock style with complex, twinkly guitars and some highly melodic (but not terribly emotive) vocals. The writing itself is quite good, with very driving, purposeful melodies—few similar albums have such catchy songs to them, and most songs have at least one good hook that makes them stand out.
I am a bit disappointed that, aside from the superb guitar work, the rest of the instrumentation is a bit lackluster. It's neat to hear the occasional glockenspiel and stuff like that, but the bass and drums aren't nearly as exciting as they should be, and the guitar has to carry the whole thing. It makes the music feel a little one-dimensional, though the good songwriting and multiple guitar layers help make up for that.
And there is the unfortunate fact that Prawn has been overshadowed (in my mind) by quite a few other similar artists lately, so while I do think this album is pretty good, there are others that basically direct upgrades of this one. But I guess I'm not going to say no to more of a good thing.
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