Buckle your seat belts for a pop punk rollercoaster in Neck Deep’s new LP, The Peace and the Panic. With a release date of Friday, August 18th, the pop punk group turns over a new leaf; trying to make sense of the world we live in and the sound to portray it in.

The group starts the track list off with “Motion Sickness”—something you might get if you were expecting an album like Life’s Not Out to Get You.

Track one is the same Neck Deep (ND) you’d expect to hear coming out of a new album, something which is going to kill a crowd when it is played live. Quick beats and heavy in guitar, The Peace and the Panic starts on a soon to be notorious ND song.

Photo by: Briana Stacy

Let’s talk about the elephant in the room though, Neck Deep’s new sound. Quickly into the album you hear a mix of old ND, power ballads (for lack of a better comparison) and a somewhat random hardcore collaboration with Architect vocalist Sam Carter. Honestly, I dig the vibe.

As you listen through, you can pick out the new sound immediately on the LP. I am not saying it sucks, because it absolutely does not, it is just a slap to the face if you were expecting Neck Deep to keep the sound they have been cultivating since Rain in July.

Songs like “Parachute”, “In Bloom”, “Critical Mistake”, “Wish You Were Here”, “Heavy Lies” and “19 Seventy Sumthin’” all have something which makes it pop out of the album as being a new sound and a possible experiment for the band.

Whether it be the vibe of the song or the overall technical workings, a good half of the album is a new territory of some kind. For that, Neck Deep has some balls.

Now, I’m curious as to why Hopeless Records, decided to release four of the 11 songs on the album with adjoining music videos. My theory is they want Neck Deep’s audience to get a taste of the new sound, but not completely divulging what specifically the sound is.

Lets be honest four videos, minus “In Bloom”, gave off the vibe the album is majorly a true junior Neck Deep album. In reality, Neck Deep is still trying to find their sound, or trying to stray away from true pop punk for a new sound, something we have never heard before from them.

As Ben Barlow told Rock Sound Magazine, “Maybe we are defining pop punk. Maybe these tracks of our own sound can be considered in the ballpark of pop punk now, or maybe it’s not. If you want to label it, I wouldn’t know what you would put on it.” That in itself is the entire album in a quote. Label it what you want, but just listen to the music as it is.

There are lots of sounds coming into this third album, but if you miss old Valencia, The Starting Line and The Spill Canvas look no further for some of those vibes coming from ND.

There is the new sound right there—more pop than punk, or possibly this is a new type of pop punk ND is trying to make happen, in more than half of the album. Am I upset about it? No, I’m the opposite of upset. I’m excited to see where Neck Deep takes this sound and what they can do with it.

Overall, this album is a sold 4 out of 5 stars. You have to be open to Neck Deep playing with their sound to really dig what is happening, but there are some solid songs in the track list. You can see they pulled from honest experiences and the reality which is happening in the world around us. There is raw emotion in most of the tracks and there are some solid classic Neck Deep sounds. There is something for every Neck Deep fan in this third album.

We all know how Neck Deep’s stage presence is. If they can make crowds all over the world scream “A Part of Me” at the top of their lungs, they have no problem turning everyone on to what they are working with now.The Peace and the Panic hits stores and online retailers this Friday, August 18th.

Preorders for the album are available HERE

Photo by: Briana Stacy

Neck Deep just wrapped up their summer on the Vans Warped Tour by announcing to fans that they will be returning to North America early next year for a headlining tour. This tour will bring Neck Deep to Santa Ana on January 18th and take them across the United States and Canada to cities like Seattle, Orlando, Toronto, New York, and Kansas City before returning back to Los Angeles on February 28th. All tickets are on sale now and available at www.ndsoundcheckclub.com.

https://youtu.be/ZMorM6M2IlI

Find Neck Deep at

Neck Deep website | Hopeless Records website

Review by: Laura Hoffman