The Hush Sound - "Like Vines"(Decaydance / Fueled By Ramen, 2006)

Hear The Music
The Hush Sound - "We Intertwined" (96 kbps, mp3)

I've got to hand it to the boys from Fall Out Boy -- they know a good sound when they hear it. The first band signed to Decaydance last year was Panic! At the Disco, which spawned the addictively fun track "I Write Sins, Not Tragedies." Now they bring us Like Vines by The Hush Sound, a Chicago band not afraid to blend the likes of the Shins with the most addictive piano rock since Ben Folds Five debuted eleven years ago. "We Intertwined" deserves to be a #1 summer hit, with its hook-filled chorus that rises in the end to the kind of raucous conclusion that I wish I could hear more often.

And from there it gets better! "A Dark Congregation" features the same upbeat piano-pop sound, but with a female vocalist who reminds me a lot of Caedmon's Call vocalist Danielle Young. As it turns out, The Hush Sound features four members who share vocal duties, something that is rarely done in pop music, since finding that singular voice to catapult a band to stardom is often deemed more important than ingenuity -- think Hootie and the Blowfish, for example. Equally impressive is the fact that the band keeps up the momentum throughout the length of this stellar sophomore album. "Sweet Tangerine," "Lighthouse" and "Magnolia" all deserve to be successful singles. This is the kind of music that's putting the midwest on the map and making Chicago into one of the hottest scenes in the nation. If you let this album go unnoticed, you deserve every ounce of the Hoobastank ilk you get.

The band is now touring as Panic! At the Disco's opening act, and will be playing several dates in the midwest during July:

July 6: Columbus OH (PromoWest Pavillion)
July 7: Chicago IL (House of Blues)
July 11: Cincinnati OH (Bogart's)
July 12: Cleveland OH (Plain Dealer Pavillon)
July 19: Indianapolis IN (Murat Egyptian Room)