Nocturnal Animals

Hailing from Atlanta GA, pop punk flavoured alternative outfit Nocturnal Animals sound is straight outta SoCal. The quartet of Mason Jones, Will Bennett, Dawson Tucker and Derrick Stephen deal in hooky melodies and bouncy rhythms with an enunciated matter-of-fact delivery. Their debut EP is a tight four-song collection that showcases the band's instinctive pop writing sensibilities and proves on several occasions that a band that exists on a pop-punk framework can break out of its four-chord box and create music with depth.

Released on Halloween, the album opens with 'Teeth' a tune teeming with vampiric references from its Pitt/Slater Interview With The Vampire intro to its tagline “It's hard to put on makeup/double take/without a reflection”. The choruses are big with choral vocal backups and twinkling guitar arpeggios. An arena filing solo lifts the song to its finale.

'Red Shoes' borrows a vibe from psychobilly with singer Mason Jones voice at his most Billie Joe with all his wide open inflections and west coast accent. The second verse opens up with piano duetting with the moving bass line over jazzy toms. The song leaves itself room to breathe winding itself up for another roaring solo from lead guitarist Will Bennett. The closer 'Satellite' is a piano-led pensive number that nicely rounds out the EP.

Despite the similar palette to the pop-punk set, Nocturnal Animals have expanded their songwriting abilities. Rarely actually touching on the “punk” aspect, instead opting for more theatric grandiose structures in a similar fashion to how Green Day made more of themselves from American Idiot forward. Dark Lit Places is a no-filler slice of this talented Georgia quartet.