BELVEDERE - The Revenge Of The Fifth
A good month before the start of summer saw the release of The Revenge Of The Fifth, the sixth album by Canadian punk band Belvedere. It is quite astonishing that the four guys managed after a twelve-year hiatus to craft the perfect soundtrack for the year’s warmest season. The prerequisite for the album to be released was that the band would still sound like they used to in the past, and not like a bunch of old men. If you listen to the twelve songs (one song for each missed year), you might think that they came out very soon after their last album Fast Forward Eats The Tape. The only concession to their age is that the musicians are now all family men and don’t really look like punks anymore.
Belvedere still play melodic punk with the necessary amounts of speed and heaviness, just like we were used from them. The songs are quite concise, and it feels as if the musicians are in a hurry to get through their material. Especially the drummer must be in top shape to keep up with this high pace all of the time. Occasionally there are some breaks that can be considered breathers, but they are rather the exception. The great thing is that the songs are generally very catchy. Red Pawn’s Race and Achilles are even so melodic that one might be tempted to call them commercial. But there are also harder moments to be found, as on Transmissions that despite some melodic components feels closer to the early hardcore sound. As Above, So Below also shows the band from its heavier side. A more conciliatory moment comes with the concluding Generation Debt where the band adopts a relaxed emo core sound, maybe because this song is aimed at the youth of today, to whom the band apologises for leaving the world in a desolate state to future generations. The lyrics are actually a very important part of the music. Most of the time they are dealing with how people should act more responsibly.
The musicians like to label themselves a skate punk band, which makes sense from a musical perspective. And frankly it doesn’t matter if you prefer to call this genre pop punk, melodic punk or whatever. The fact remains that the band has lost none of their freshness and continue exactly where they left off over a decade ago. After all these years it is still a pleasure to listen to Belvedere.