Park Slope - Park Slope

Park Slope

Park Slope
self-released; 2016

3.6 out of 5

By Jamie Funk

Park Slope is a four-piece band comprised of Isaiah Mendez (lead vocals/guitar), Jimmy Ventura (drums), Michael A. J. Freyre (guitar/vocals) and Dakota Maiello (bass). The band released Self-Titled, an EP written and recorded over 2014 and 2015 to showcase their sound.

The EP contains four songs which are some of their first and the results are pretty impressive and certainly build a solid foundation for them. I thought the band painted a concise picture of their sound in a fairly short amount of time. They mentioned they take inspiration from bands like Title Fight, Citizen, Sunny Day Real Estate and  American Football. That all makes sense when you start to delve into their music.

They open with “Intro” which is more like a song. It’s pretty meaty at three-plus-minutes and is an instrumental piece. The song initially has a tinge of post-rock with clean, melodic guitar not too far from a band like Explosion In The Sky. Once the band lays on the distortion they rock out pretty hard. 

“Intro” transitions into “Scribbled” which is where you can hear a little bit more influence from bands like Sunny Day Real Estate and Title Fight. It’s a well-written song with some great delivery. The band is in the pocket and I enjoyed the jagged guitar lines and intense drumming. I also enjoyed the ambiguous, poetic language in the song. He sings, “Free-form words from my throat, Choke down the over emotional. I'll smother it until my heart turns cold.”

The centerpiece and highlight is “Traverse.” It’s a sprawling six-plus-minute song that is dynamic and plays into the band's strengths. The band never spends too much time on one part and packs a lot of great riffs in the song. They close with another solid song entitled “Rain to Soil.” It rocks just as hard as the songs before and really solidifies the band's sound.

​I was really impressed at how much the band was able to build a foundation with only four songs. This should be a very indicator of what their full-length will sound like.

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