Straylight Run is still better than Taking Back Sunday

The EP is a stranger phenomena in the music industry. It’s tough to know what an artist is thinking when one is released. Did the artist just not feel like writing enough songs for a full album? Did the artist just not want to wait to release something until there was more material for fear that fans would forget they existed?

If either of those applies to Straylight Run’s digital release Un Mas Dos, it would be the latter, because the band’s fans had honest reason to fear they had broken up.

In the past year, Straylight Run have released one album, The Needles the Space, dropped by their record label and lost co-lead vocalist, Michelle DaRosa, who left the band to do solo work.

Luckily, Un Mas Dos is a somewhat return to form for Straylight Run, even with all of the turmoil the band has been through. It isn’t a copycat of their first two releases, but it is of similar quality – despite the fact that it’s only three songs.

“Watch and Wait” is the album’s opener, and the EP’s weakest song. It jumps from soft piano-led verses to a louder, guitar-led chorus, which is different from anything the band has done before. Yet it’s not executed particularly well, and doesn’t really fit with the style they’re best at.

Also, the lyrics – “They say if you don’t believe in something, then you’re gonna fall for anything / Well, I say if you believe in anything you’ve already fallen for something” – are cynical, a bit trite, and depressing.

The other tracks “Try” and “Ten Ton Shoes” are much better. They both are much more beat-driven, and focus much more on the piano. However, the lyrics are still not up to Straylight Run’s previous standard. Lines like “It’s a long cold winter in the dead of night / And the candidates are saying they can make it right” in “Ten Ton Shoes” are just annoying.

Though it’s not great, Un Mas Dos is better than Straylight Run’s last album, and it does its job: it reminds fans that the band still exists. It’s a good first step back to prominence.