Album Review: Grandview - 'Everything Between Paint and A Wall'

Grandview are familiar. It’s Citizen and Turnover all over again with their sophomore offering, but Everything Between Paint and a Wall proves that whoever said there was anything wrong with familiar didn’t know what they were talking about, and that more often than not familiar is the stepping stone to thick, charming nostalgia.

With ‘Paint,’ Everything Between Paint and a Wall is graced with quiet, subdued beginnings. Quickly though, the record picks up the pace with ‘Seeking Out Gold (The Former)', where the grungy vocals and alt. progressive guitar melodies ring in the kind of feels Balance and Composure and Turnover are privy to producing. Not to say that Grandview are generic, because they’re anything but. 

A friend mentioned once that Everything Between Paint and a Wall is the record that Transit should have written in 2013. Indeed, while remaining wonderfully palatable in thoroughly nostalgic, pop rock tracks such as ‘In Good Company’ and ‘Shaper,’ Grandview maintain a note of interest in their melodies and riffs that leads each track into the unpredictable. However, while each song is in every way perfectly fitting on the record, some, like ‘To The Sun’ and ‘Saw The Sky’ feel a bit drawn out. Nevertheless, Grandview manage to inject enough aggression and emotion for things to keep from ever being dull.

‘Say Nothing’ sees the band put their ambient prog rock styling to work on one of those movie sound bites that are a dime a dozen about three quarters of the way into records claimed by bands that shout emo. Cynicism aside though, tracks like ‘To The Sun’ and ‘Sitting On Gold (The Latter)’ host a slow build up of rhythm and power that culminates brilliantly at the peak of the song. All the while, Everything Between Paint and A Wall makes you feel the way you would if you remembering all the summers you’ve ever had, all at once.

As it began with ‘Paint,’ Everything Between Paint and A Wall ends, of course, with ‘Wall’ and it's only at this moment that it can be understood just how much time and thought Grandview have put into this record. Not just in choosing the titles of the record and the songs, but also in the way the songs seem to build and grow in every moment of the record, while all the time creating a feeling of familiarity and manifest nostalgia. A late December release ruled it out of our best of 2013 lists, but a little alteration post 2013 can’t hurt.

1. Paint

2. Seeking Out Gold (The Former)

3.  The Only Constant

4. In Good Company

5. To The Sun

6. 7

7. Saw The Sky

8. Say Nothing

9. Shaper

10. Sitting On Gold (The Latter)

11. Wall