As I walked into Vault 350 last Saturday night, the air was so thick and hot I could barely breathe; at first I thought to myself “this place needs a better AC unit” but as I took one look around I realized I was sorely mistaken, it wasn’t that at all. It was the sheer volume of people packed into this club that had me ‘sauna-feed’ in a matter of minutes. Needless to say, it’s a great thing when you can sell out a show in a weeks time and keep each and every person in attendance happily moshing and raising fists in the air like there’s no tomorrow.
I knew of Strung Out from a previous director I had worked with who shot one of their videos, so getting to see the band live was a treat for me. Strung Out delivers high octane songs chock tight full of punk rock melodies and aggressive guitar licks, not to mention the pounding bass and drum rhythms that make this an elaborate musical feast. Lyrically, vocalist Jason Cruz weaves a tale between bitterness and anger to happiness and serene sounds that dig deep.
This night was being recorded live as Strung Out played a considerable amount of material from their most recent effort, Exile in Oblivion with two of the crowd’s obvious favorites being Vampires and Swan Song. In addition; S.O. gave us Her Name in Blood and Analog, meshing together an aggressive set that covered a wide array of sounds and emotions. From the bands previous recordings everyone was treated to: Lost Motel, Barfly and Deville, and of course, my personal favorites Razor Sex and Cemetery, which in total gave the crowd over an hour of mind blowing angst, passion and talent handed to them on a silver platter. Top notch band and top notch night.
Strung Out is:
- Jason Cruz
- Jake Kiley
- Chris Aiken
- Jordan Burns
- Rob Ramos
