Context – Losing my goddamn mind

Today at work I got two separate budget requests that are both due next Friday, which means I have more work to do now than I ever have before.  At least at my current job.  At least since like, September.  I don’t know, guys, it’s hard to compare stress levels before and after the fact, but I probably shouldn’t be taking time from my precious lunch hour to write up this report on These Arms Are Snakes’s debut album.  We as humans are really good at doing things that are… ill-advised, to say the least.

More-so to the point at hand–this band is pretty good.  I give them a C+ for now, but hope they grow on me.  All of the elements are there: a screamo-ish foundation broken by spoken/shouted lyrics all syncopated over irregular feeling grooves and time signatures.  Kind of like if Toe and Senses Fail did a crossover album.  Or more like if Q and Not U had more anger in them.  Or something.

Sidebar: I need to re-read this post in the next few weeks to remind myself to dig deeper into Q and Not U.

For some reason though, this Scream-Toe band isn’t finding it’s footing in my psyche like I expected them to after the first song.  Maybe it’s my feeling of impending workplace doom, maybe I’m more over my emo roots than I had previously expected, or maybe this is one of those inexplicable events where all your favorite ingredients make a piss-poor recipe.  Well, not piss-poor, just kind of bland.  And not even bland, but maybe just not something you wanted to eat for dinner.

I have a vague memory of this band from high school, where one of the local bands from the Chicago-area were on a flyer with these guys.  Maybe 504 Plan toured with them.  Or if not them than Farewell Night.  Or if not them than the Academy Is.  Or some shit.  One of those up-and-coming scene kid collections from the early aughts.  I remember thinking “These Arms Are Snakes is a weird name for a band,” and upon a brief exploration deemed them unfavorable.

Oh very young, and all that Cat Stevens smooth jazz.  That we all had the sophisticated tastes we develop throughout our early adulthood when we were but tweens exploring the depths of angst and misunderstood feelings.  O’ that our souls develop at a slower rate than our physical forms, stunting the growth of spirit required to process such transcendent sounds as these!  Lament and tragedy, dear readers, lament and tragedy.  I firmly believe that taste is as indicative of when you consume a media as much as it is the media in-and-of itself.  I can only hope that a future time will have me responding more energetically to These Arms As Snakes than I am today, lest the image I have of myself and my interests be forever shattered as I spiral out back into the abyss of identity formation.

Too melodramatic?