EHP 0.26: The Setup / Schematic Of A Waking Life split CD/LP [ purchase cd ] [ purchase lp ] Pressing Information: 1,000 CDs 500 black Richmond Virginia's THE SETUP blast through four of their hardest offerings to date. Combining elements of hardcore, punk rock, and straight up metal, these southern boys detonate chunky guitar riffs that would make any early METALLICA fan go nuts with collapsing vocals. The results? An overly aggresive and sadistic composition for fans of everything from CONVERGE to TRAGEDY. Features Chris Kirby from LIGHT THE FUSE AND RUN on guitar. SCHEMATIC OF WAKING LIFE lay down three tracks of post hardcore perfection. Songs suggestive of a DC sound from the 1990's brewed with the updated offerings of HOT CROSS and OFF MINOR. These New Englanders manage to be melodic and cathcy without loosing their frantic edge. This split, the bands follow up to their cdep 'Cinders And Seeds' on Bug Empire, takes everything up a notch. Desperate and controlled. Passionate and angry. TRACK LISTING: The Setup 1. Calling All Ninjas 2. Does This Record Look Good On Me 3. Post-Graduate Barbarian Schematic Of A Waking Life 4. Symbolic Gaps 5. From Lion To Child 6. A Few Years Dumber 7. Echoes Are Not Voices REVIEWS: Indian Journal Review March 5-11th, 2005 (Wade Coggeshall) The split CD between Richmond, Va.'s The Setup and Bristol, Conn.'s Schematic of a Waking Life offers a satisfying taste of two largely unknown bands with separate psyches and musical élan, but both delivered with feral energy. The Setup contribute three songs here. They're a four-piece band with chaos in their concepts. Thick guitars shroud the proceedings, while members take turns rambling nihilistic thoughts in choked, dirt-throated voices. "I saw your revolution on the pages of a Seventeen magazine," they croak on the punishing Motorhead onslaught "Does This Record Look Good On Me?" "I'll paint the walls with my own brains," they threaten midway through the embrangled mindstomp of "Post-Graduate Barbarian." It may be toeing the edge a little too much for some, but The Setup are a painful psychward visit you can really get into. Schematic of a Waking Life are the punk relatives of The Setup. Their songs are shorter and faster, but equally at home being disorganized and intentionally maladroit for intensity's sake. Starting with "Symbolic Gaps," snotty, rabid rock rages through rhythms designed for obstacle courses, behind passionately primed singing. "A Few Years Dumber" gives off an amphetamined reggae tilt and "Echoes Are Not Voices" is a frantic, pounding plea for audible substance ("Do we talk just to hear ourselves? / We will always be silent in a world where no one even tries to hear each other.") Ox fanzine (Thomas) Only in the last issue did I mention that we definitely need more covers with beetles on them and now there's one more coming in. But the songs are not as fragile as beetles, no pure hate attacks like HIS HERO IS GONE used to deliver them. John, singer of the threesome THE SETUP seems to be very nihilistic and broken, so you almost start to worry about the guy. Especially when he promises to paint the walls with his brains. A very intense piece of music offering dark songs. Get well soon,John, autoaggression is not a salution! SCHEMANTIC OF A WALKING LIFE are a little easier to deal with, lyrically you get good advice and while THE SETUP focus on morbid monotony their partners in crime have a lot more mood, speed and rhythm changes in there. The tracks are hectic and chaotic and the voice tends to crash sometimes. For the CATHARSIS-fan I recommend THE SETUP , if you like decent Dischord-sound SCHEMANTIC OF A WALKING LIFE will be your favourite one. Both bands have potential, more than enough for a full length. (7/7) Enough Fanzine (Jan) Another fine release by Electric Human Project Records, which totally blew me away with the release of the Otesanek CD. This split album heads into another direction nonetheless. Hailing from Richmond, The Setup feature Chris from Light The Fuse And Run on guitar, but are quite different to them. Starting of with the catchy and rhythmic song “Calling All Ninjas”, they reminded me of older Jr. Ewing stuff. Later on the get more heavy with hints of Portland sound. After three songs, it´s time for Schematic Of A Waking Life to take over. Quite different than The Setup, SOAWL are more based on what once was know as “DC sound”. Take the energy and passion of Gray Matter´s “Take It Back” MLP and fuse it with frantic sound of current Level Plane bands and you´ll have four melodic yet energetic songs. Well done! The New Scheme issue #11 This split features seven songs by two relatively new bands that creatively mix hardcore with numerous elements, though in two completely different ways. The Setup are from Richmond and feature Chris Kirby from Light The Fuse And Run on guitar. They play fairly standard, but really well written and executed hardcore/metal crossover. It leans more toward frantic hardcore, with choppy rhythms and subtly melodic guitar lines that play off of one another well. The dueling vocal lines work together and against each other in the same way the guitars do, adding a really defining element to each of the songs. They remind me of a bit heavier version of Neil Perry at times, even old Converge as well. There's something immediately a little bit familiar about The Setup, though once I listened to these songs a few times, I still couldn't find one band they seem to sounds like. Schematic Of A Waking Life share a fair amount musically with The Setup in their dual-guitar apprach, as well as rhythmically urgent songwriting. But at the same time, they mix this fast hardcore approach with a much more measured post-punk edge that harkens to D.C. bands new and old. At times, the bouncy rhythms, angular vocal lines, and completely melodic guitar lines all remind me quite a bit of Hot Cross (which can't possibly be a bad thing). The vocals especially, are pretty abrasively half shouted and half spoken, which works perfectly to give a lot of variety and depth to their sound. There's something catchy about these songs, though they're far from overtly melodic which also reminded me of Hot Cross. The seven songs here work together well, though the two bands don't have a ton in common specifically. Which, in almost every way, makes this the perfect split. Two new bands start at roughly the same starting point, with a frantic and urgent take on post-hardcore. But then they proceed to go in fairly opposite, but equally interesting directions with it. Impact Press issue #52 (MP) Two bands came together for this split. The Setup contributes the first three tracks full of controlling screams and metal riffs. Snapcase came to mind, especially with the drum sound. Intricate melodies woven with double bass and screams create three hardcore tracks for a powerful start. Schematic Of A Waking Life contribute four more dynamic, indie math songs with passionate melodies and lyrics to mix, without losing their toughness. These two bands create a nice concotion of mathcore, but who needs labels? This is good stuff Aversion Online Richmond, VA's The Setup (not the Belgian act of the same name) start this split off with three tracks of material that's definitely a bit heavier and more aggressive than their past efforts. Expect scathing vocal screams, lots of dirty textures to the instrumentation, a pretty significant emphasis on rhythm, and enough dynamic shifts to add some darker atmospheres to the writing. "Calling All Ninjas" drops lots of metal riffing, including some (dare I say) tremolo picking riffs that are reminiscent of black metal on some level; "Does This Record Look Good on Me?" has a slightly quieter break with only faintly distorted guitars amongst plenty of chunky rhythms and some excellent dissonant layers; and "Post-Graduate Barbarian" opens with another almost clean passage before plowing into some midpaced chord progressions that are a bit more powerful than the preceding tracks (though all three are quite good). The recording is also a bit grittier than their last EP was, definitely adding to its harder edge. The drums stand out a little but do have a pretty nice sort of thunder happening, the bass is distorted and beefs things up right in line with the guitars, and the guitars are dry and fairly thick with solid midrange - not too clear and certainly not polished, but definitely working well in cooperation with the basslines. And I really enjoy the lyrics here, they're creatively written and make their point without beating anything into the ground: "Is it getting hot in here or am I still just faking it? Let's be reasonable here, the beginning of the rest of my life is merely the death of passion." Good stuff. Schematic of a Waking Life follows with four shorter tracks that have more of a frantic indie feel and vocals that are screamed but have a little bit of strange melody happening. There's definitely an off kilter rock thing going on as well, the tempos and structures are borderline catchy at times, but the guitar parts are quirky enough to really add a different sensibility. The basslines roam around as well, they're not just laying a foundation for the guitars at all. "A Few Years Dumber" has more of a spacious construction where the panning of the guitars interacts more obviously with lots of seemingly unrelated riffs that piece together over top of one another, and "Echoes Are Not Voices" is a little more succinct and uniquely memorable with its winding note-based runs and unified rhythms. As far as the production goes, it's somewhat similar to what The Setup has going on here - a little dirty, but well mixed, and fitting for what they're doing. I'd say these tracks are a bit more cohesively tracked since the drums are nice and warm and fall in with the other instrumentation, but there's definitely a fitting rawness to the overall bite. Here the lyrics are pretty introspective in a way, but definitely reflecting on larger topics as well: "And how comforting is it to sleep in beds of roses when we all know that tomorrow they'll rot?" The layout looks really nice, using a minimal color scheme of mostly bright green, bright yellow, and brown with a little black and white for high contrast designs of insects and such. Half of the booklet goes to each band for lyrics and such, with plenty of artwork surrounding everything, so it kind of jumps out at you. A good split, indeed. I'm more interested in The Setup's half of the disc, but Schematic of a Waking Life doesn't disappoint. the312.com (Dan Ozzi) The Setup is recommended for fans of hardcore music. Not any very specific sub-genre, just straight up real hardcore. It’s heavy, it’s loud, it has no structure, it’s got the guy from Light the Fuse and Run. As for Schematic of a Waking Life, I’d say it’s safe to file them under the Hot Cross/Saetia/Off Minor category, only more abrasive. Add their four songs to The Setup’s three and you’ve got yourself a release that reminds that honest music is still being made out there. Deep Fry Bonanza webzine (Greg) This is a split EP with Richmond, Va.’s The Set Up taking a crack at the first three tracks ("Calling All Ninjas," "Does This Record Look Good On Me?," and "Post-Graduate Barbarian’) and by the looks of the titles, these guys - despite initially sounding like Converge or some other post-hardcore band heavy on the chugga chuggas - actually step it up a notch with witty lyrics that surpass most of the mindless, tough guy monosyllabic drone barked out by bands of this ilk ("you’re working harder at not being punk/than you ever were/at being real"). The Set Up has a bit of a screamo/Blood Brothers vibe, what with the dueling vocals approach; howlers howling over the abrasive odd time signature metalcore. Unfortunately, the howling belittles the band’s cheeky wordsmithing. Not the best of the lot, not the worst, with only three songs to measure them by, it’s hard to give them a fair shake. Connecticut’s Schematic Of Waking Life finishes off the EP with the last four songs which are decidedly less abrasive than The Set Up. SOWL opts for more of the angular post punk found in bands like Circus Lupus or The Monorchid. I like this kind of stuff; I like it very much. Reminds me a lot of a time in the world where post punk and emo came together for a brief dance before both genres got thinned out and streamlined by the mainstream. Now I got to go pull out my old Circus Lupus records and I thank the Schematic Of Waking Life for making me do so.