The Jealous Sound Revived

Many stumbled across the Jealous Sound in the year 2000, after the indie rock band out of Los Angeles unleashed their debut five song EP to the world on Better Looking Records. Armed with the dual soothing and seething vocals of ex-Knapsack singer and guitarist Blair Shehan, the EP made an impression in the ears of everyone privy to the rock and even some privy to the roll.

Then something happened - three years of waiting. Almost immediately after signing with a major label in early 2001, the label lost all of its distribution. The label must go unnamed as a condition of the Jealous Sound's release.

"Essentially the label was bought and the new owners rifled through it and decided what was profitable and what was in their vision and what was not," Shehan said. "So the band with a gold record in pocket was obviously going to have their next record put out, and many bands were just dropped."

Though some interest in the Jealous Sound remained, and they avoided being dropped, the label did little more than stifle the bands' album making potential. With dedication to the record they wanted to make, Shehan and his band mates persevered and were finally released from the contract they did not intend to sign in late 2002.

Re-enter Better Looking Records and the glorious new full-length "Kill Them With Kindness." The Jealous Sound remains a band striding forth with passion. The band should be pictured next to the dictionary definition of "all-star cast." Besides Shehan's remarkable work with Knapsack, guitarist Pedro Benito (Sunday's Best), bassist John McGinnis (Neither Trumpets Nor Drums), and drummer Adam Wade (Jawbox, Shudder To Think) all have resumes shining with impressive and impacting original music.

Fresh off a tour with the Foofighters, the Jealous Sound now finds itself in the middle of a month-long tour with the New Trust, which features ex-members of Benton Falls and current members of the Velvet Teen.

The tour rolled into the Mohawk Place late last week, and it may have just rolled the place right over. Shehan's vocals are still as fresh and passionate as on the songs from the EP, now three years old. The new songs from "Kill Them With Kindness" burst through with an ungoverned fury with no stage moves or rooster rock. This is pure honesty.

"We stay away from what Dave Grohl termed 'the Warped Tour Boogie,' where the drummer raises his sticks, and everyone looks at each other and simultaneously jumps up with their guitars raised as a tribute to some unforeseen rock entity. God, I hate the Warped Tour Boogie," Shehan mused, muffling a laugh.

The band began the show with the opening track from "Kill Them With Kindness," the moving and refreshingly straightforward "Hope For Us." Shehan's vocals penetrated deep into the night: "Did you celebrate without me?/ Did you tell them all about me?/ Did you sell me out?/ If you ever had a doubt/ Kiss me on the mouth." The words resounded with the bitter memory of a love exhumed.

Opening the show was Dieradiodie, a six-piece indie rock band fresh off the main stage at Birmingham's fabled Furnace Fest. Their three layers worth of guitars were reminiscent of late Eighties U2 while still maintaining a mix of modern emo and indie similar to Brandtson going on a date with The Mars Volta. It was the San Diego band's first appearance in Buffalo. The New Trust played second, with the wonderful and pleasing vocals of J.J. Staples, which both crooned like Robert Smith, and rocked like Billy Corgan at the same time.

The Jealous Sound's "Kill Them With Kindness" is available at record stores everywhere on Better Looking Records. The New Trust's "We Are Fast Moving Motherf****rs. We Are Men and Women of Action" is available on the band's Web site, www.thenewtrust.com.