Bridge and Tunnel is a punk-influenced indie rock quartet that is intense and thoughtful. East/West is their debut full length and it is a solid release, with a welcome guitar screech and dose of distrust/skepticism/reality. The band sounds a bit like the Jazz June mixed with Cap 'n' Jazz mixed with Anti Flag. They’ve got some bouncy art rock riffs, a few sing along verses, some gentle meandering moments that explode into a punch of raw frustration.
Released on No Idea Records late last year, East/West is kind of a throwback record, to the era of Fugazi, Rainer Maria, Superchunk, The Ghost, Archers of Loaf and the like. It is a record that is intense and fitful but doesn’t rely on spitting and fury alone, it is based on intelligence and hope. Smart lyrics, dynamic musical shifts, varied vocals and vocal deliveries and layers of emotion make East/West a pretty good album.
The album starts with high pitched guitar picking and frontman/guitarist Jeff Cunningham shouting “How easily we forget, how easily we comply” – with a gruff tone similar to Chuck Ragan of Hot Water Music. Guitarist Rachel Rubino adds in her stressed vocals, to accentuate and battle with Cunningham’s later, and it gives the songs a feeling of building and togetherness and a powerful mix of sounds that build a wall of fury or tease each other when appropriate.
The song “Wartime Souvenirs” is a frustrated tale of people forgetting there is a war going on, forgetting there are atrocities occurring everywhere, as they buy new DVDs and get lost in their own lives. The 2nd track “Call to the Comptrollers Office” is about struggling to create beauty and do things that matter in a place that tires you out with constant motion and bombards you with bright lights and slogans. The dueling and complimentary male/female vocals are again used, as they are on most of the album.
The 3rd track on the album – “Night Owls” – is the strongest on the album. It drives with machine gun like rhythm and is a danceable singable beat that swims in arty guitar bends and has wonderful lyrics. On this track Rubino takes the lead on the vocals and thrusts out "All my friends are into liquid trends, when they drink what they can and they pretend to dance. When the volume’s up, and the lights go down, and the shoes come off, the informal gowns will not cover up the maps I’ve drawn on your arms, around your ribs, through your chest to your heart, where I live in a cage with a wheel and a maze. It’s so perfect. I’m amazed at how we’re all struggling to feel alive tonight in the city bathed in neon lights. All my friends think they’re chemists when they combine powders and liquids in their test tub throats and their iron lungs, in their funneled nostrils and drug-numbed tongues."
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