Album Reviews

After touring in Japan together in 2013, Useless ID’s Yotam Ben Horin and Dan Cribb (formerly of The Decline) kept in touch and decided it would be a fun idea to release an acoustic split together. Pee Records agreed and so… well, here you go! Both songwriters deliver two new songs and one cover each on what turned out to be a solid release.

Yotam gets to open the proceedings with the beautiful “The Other Side Of The Country” and “Oh, Suffering”, both of which consist of nothing more than Yotam’s voice and a lonely acoustic guitar, before tackling Jawbreaker’s “I Love You So Much It’s Killing Us Both” and ending up with one of the best Jawbreaker covers I’ve ever heard.

Dan’s half of the split sees him teaming up with The Swellers’ Nick Diener. Their voices go well together, which you’ll find out right away when the chorus of “I Need You To Be Me” hits the speakers. Next up is the equally warm and melodic “Won’t Ask Much” before stripping down Alkaline Trio’s “Fatally Yours”.

I’m always a bit hesitant when punkrockers go acoustic, but if they’d all sound like this? Well, count me in.