Album Reviews

There are countless horror movies that take place at a cabin in the middle of the woods. For the characters in those movies, it never turns out to be a good idea to venture out there. For musicians on the other hand, it seems to be working out just fine. First we had Bon Iver holing up somewhere in Wisconsin for his “For Emma, Forever Ago” album and now Evan Weiss and his drummer Josh Sparks did wrote the third Into It. Over It. at a cabin in Vermont.

Did it pay off to go to a place that was ‘an hour from the nearest gas station, an hour from the nearest grocery store… no phone, no Internet’? It sure did. “Standards” turns out to be Into It. Over It.’s most accomplished album to date, and if you have heard the two albums that preceded this one, you know that’s saying something.

Recorded completely analog with Josh Vanderslice’s help, “Standards” sounds all warm and nice in all the right places and swings with remarkable ease between amped up jams like “Vis Major” and “Adult Contempt” and intimate tunes such as “Old Lace & Ivory” and the piano-enhanced “Required Reading”. No matter which route Weiss decides to take, the result is always highly satisfactory and sure to please everyone for whom bands like Sunny Day Real Estate, Mineral and American Football hold no secrets. Hell, “Who You Are ≠ Where You Are” even manages to combine both approaches and gets away with it.

I’m not sure if these songs will turn into standards for the emo genre, but Weiss definitely raised the bar for future Into It. Over It. releases with this one.