A Rocket To The Moon

The Rainy Day Sessions EP

 

With 2009’s On Your Side, A Rocket To The Moon further cemented Fueled By Ramen’s reputation for finding bands that connect strongly with young fans hungry for huge choruses and lyrics they can really relate to. Bursting with melodies, the band certainly fit comfortably on their roster, while also boasting an edge reminiscent of the Drive-Thru Records bands of the early ’00s—the Starting Line, Allister, etc.—and their full-length debut was a solid if unspectacular record that won a lot of fans.

The Rainy Day SessionsEP sees the band revisit four tracks from that album as well as delivering an inventive cover, having recruited female bluegrass duo Larkin Poe to collaborate on the songs with them, which were all recorded live. There is a peacefulness and grace to the whole thing, the feeling that nothing is forced and everything was allowed to come in its own time, and this conveys the sense that there was a real joy in recording the songs. Reworking “Like We Used To,” “Baby Blue Eyes,” “Mr. Right” and “On A Lonely Night,” the latter three actually best their studio originals, benefitting from the elegant vocals of Larkin Poe (sisters Rebecca and Megan Lovell), the sparse instrumentation allowing the songs to breathe in a way that gives them a new dynamic. Their cover of Beyonce’s “Single Ladies”—already a massive hit in its own right, having racked up over one million plays on Fueled By Ramen’s official YouTube channel in only a few days—is unexpectedly affecting, wielding a sensitivity and sincerity that seems to come from out of nowhere. In fact, many who are not overly familiar with the song’s lyrics will not even realize what they’re listening to until the telltale chorus arrives, the change in tone the musicians imbue the song with so dramatically different from that of the original.

All in all, this is a charming and well-executed collection that will very likely drag a lot more ears in the band’s direction. It will be interesting to see how this effects what they do subsequently, too, since this unexpected stylistic left turn has shown a side to A Rocket To The Moon that is in many ways more alluring than their initial incarnation, and fans will quite rightly demand more of the same.

Fueled By Ramen

“On A Lonely Night”