There’s a great urgency, mild punk kick, rock sensibility and great sense of fun to this EP from the Mitch Tones Band who hail from Greenbank, Ontario. The most stunning thing though is the sheer quality of the songs.
Starting with their best foot forward ‘World of Trouble’ takes you by surprise both with its authenticity and its accessibility. When I first heard it I imagined as stripped back Buckcherry or Bullets and Octane – two harder rocking bands but with the same sense of style and mastery of melody.
‘Devil She Is’ that follows is equally as memorable and just as rocking, whilst ‘Ropes Around their Neck’ adds a jauntiness and touch of Tom Waits to the mix. So far so eclectic, but the great quality of this band is that they seem to be able to breathe in anything and breath it out with their own distinctive stamp.
‘Johnny BlackGun’ takes us back to the roots of Rock and Roll with bluesy tones and notes before it amps up in the chorus to a fuel-injected Gospel meets Country wash, before falling back on its Chuck Berry meets Gene Vincent posturings. It’s a wonderful mash that just shows what some bands are just naturally capable of producing given a wide range of influences.
The EP closes with the slowest song on offer ‘Not Waking Up’ which channels plenty of emotion and passion and really highlights voice and guitars, though strangely for me at least its the least satisfying song here, I still don’t know why that is, it’s a perfectly fine song, beautifully constructed and played, it just doesn’t excite me as much in the context of an EP as the more charged material.
The liner notes ask you to imagine “a modernized take on blues – rock & storytelling: the likes of The Tragically Hip shaking hands with Pearl Jam” Now I completely agree with the first statement, though for me the sound is more complex and if I had to name a band I’d be in Glorious Sons territory. The best thing about Mitch Tones band tough for me is that I can just imagine them augmented by a Folkier set of instruments from fiddle to banjo, accordion and mandolin, and with songs like these the world could be theirs.
The best EP I’ve heard all year and the one that shows the most promise of great thinks to come.
Mitch Tones Band EP, available on all major music platforms October 31st, 2018