On Kill The Ghost, Dallas-based Little Image’s third record, crisp guitars, sharp drums, stormy vocals, and a keen sense of pop delivered like a punk outfit with high production values, are the defining characteristics.
Tracks at the tail end of the album reflect this sound in the most radio-friendly manner. “Easy To Love,” “The Rabbit,” and “Always Ends” have a “Matchbox Twenty” safeness that make them good singles material for the mainstream audience. However, they don’t truly reflect the album’s layers.
At its heart, the album is about cleanly produced pop-punk music that is catchy due to the simplicity in its song writing and composition. But Little Image do not appear to be content with just chucking up what obviously comes out of their song creation process. The band genuinely challenges itself to see what else it can do with its core ingredients.
Resisting its middle-of-the-road 2000s-era post-grunge urges is “The Pressure,” which has a corny eighties post-punk flamboyance as if it’s from a punk band getting all excited about the new synth sound that it has just discovered. “Run Forever” and “Kill The Ghost” sound as if that same band is now pioneering the post-punk sound, being lean, edgy, and without fluff. On “Novacaine” and “Shots I’m Not Calling,” this former post-punk outfit seems to have discovered nineties rock, and has wholeheartedly embraced this new heavy guitar sound.
The album is at its most interesting on the slow and moody numbers, where the band truly spreads its artistic wings. “The Reaper” goes to and fro between a quiet verse with subtly intricate electronic effects and an explosive dreamlike melodic chorus. “Real Estate” takes the subtle electronic elements into cinematic territory like a soundtrack by Trent Reznor, with muted pianos and tiny hints of distortions. The electronic “Defcon” takes the band’s style into trip hop territory, where beats and heavy bases run the show, creating a chilled out but ominous atmosphere. Finally, on “Don’t Matter,” the band adds a little flavor of R&B to its music and gets soulful and vulnerable, as if Bruno Mars fancied dabbling in punk-tinged indie rock music.
Kill The Ghost delivers fine moments of throwback mainstream alternative rock for those attracted to this music. But the album is so much more satisfying the further it goes away from this disposition. This album has layers; plain vanilla, it most certainly is not.
