Pinstripe 45’s: James Taylor nose-dive

Sure, with their name, you would think this band would be either ska or Christian pop-punk, but that’s waaaaay off. I reviewed the Pinstripe 45s EP Studies in Timing and Coincidence, and found it to feel along the lines of a haunted fishing hole: spooky, yet catchy. It’s not for everybody, but I think their sound can definitely have an audience.

Imagine if James Taylor (famous for “Fire and Rain,” and other well-made songs) took an emotional nose-dive. Then, imagine he moved to a shed out int the middle of Pennsylvania, and that shed were haunted, then he wrote songs about the whole experience, and you’d get a pretty good feeling for what the Pinstripe 45s sound like.

I mean all that in a good way, too.

The Pinstripe 45s have a sound that isn’t like a lot out there right now, which is commendable, and promising of them as a band. Vocally, they have a nice harmonic technique in just about all their sounds that remind me of some Simon and Garfunkel, although higher in pitch than most of their works. This is where the haunted feeling comes from for me. I dig it, but not as much as I think a lot of other people will. In the end, only your ear will be the deciding factor, just be sure to give it a chance to grow on you.

The downside to the singing style is that it de-emphasizes the lyrics, leaving them hard to follow (for me, anyway), in exchange for their sound. That’s not really a bad thing, but if you’re the type that likes to follow lyrics and extract meaning from them, you probably won’t find much from these guys. The end result is that you hear the repeated phrases, the catches, but not much else. Most any music you hear on the radio is like that, anyway, so it’s something forgiveable.

One song I really thought worked out well is “Times Like These.” I’ll give it to you below. In it, you really get a sense of what the Pinstripe 45s’ sound is capable of, with the haunting vocals, heavy acoustic guitar with some instrumental backing lending it a nice weight and depth otherwise not present in their other songs.

Enjoi the free stuff:

Times Like These - Download - Stream
Follow Me Down - Download - Stream

Myspace: http://www.myspace.com/pinstripe45s

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Disclaimer: Since we normally post about Christian artists, we feel obligated to let you know that, to the best of our knowledge, the Pinstripe 45s make no claims to being Christ-followers.  We just liked their music enough to include them on The Blah Blah anyway.