The Departure's 'Gateways' EP review

The Departure, a band from Salt Lake City band, has released a new EP.

The Departure is a 5-piece progressive rock band from Salt Lake City, UT.  They tie together elements of metal and punk into their sound.  Their band name likely gave inspiration to the EP's title, Gateways, based on the themes of their music.  The transit themes of the comings and goings of everyday life are some of the motifs that spiral within range within the EP.  Also, rolling with the high-energized concepts, there are hints of the band striving to fulfill a bigger sound.  There are instances where it looks like The Departure is attempting to fill their songs with a more symphonic approach to their music.  In this case, this works in a more expansive way to fulfill their themes whilst melding title to track.

Consisting of Ryan DeBlanc (vocals, guitar), Gavin Allein (drums), Aidan McDonald (guitar), Max Hedding (bass) and Dylan Proesch (keyboard, vocals), the band started out with the lead singer DeBlanc collaborating with his sister, Maci, until she decided to leave the band in order to focus more on her school work.  The Departure soon developed more members, with the addition of McDonald, Hedding, Allein, and Proesch leading to their signature sound.  The band is proud to name some of their accolades as opening for some big acts, like A Day To Remember, Hotel Books, Oceans Ate Alaska, Assuming We Survive, Neon Trees, Capital Cities, Phantogram and Cold War Kids at the Utah Arts Festival Bonanza Campout 2016 and playing for X96 Big Ass Show 2014 (A Day To Remember, Neon Trees, Capital Cities).

The first track to The Departure’s EP opens on a high note with sounds that don’t spiral out of control.  There is an order to the pacing and everything is executed in excruciating detail.  The music comes off as clear and concise, yet with a slight hesitation to let loose that comes off as a bit strained.  But once the vocals come around, this seems to set the band at ease and everything comes across as more rhythmic.  The rock anthem soars with DeBlanc’s vocals.  DeBlanc shows his fun side as the lead singer strums the chords to the guitar with his mouth and enters an expletive before the song ends, showing the band’s lighter side.

In “Incompetence,” this song comes off as rather intense.  There are elements of metal here that are grounded with more prominence here.  This is evident as DeBlanc’s lasting screams in angst fades into the ether of the song.

Listeners will catch the exciting sounds of the high-powered chorus in “Forget Everything” and “The Sea Part II.”

There are elements of auto-tunes in the latter track, but audiences will fixated by an orchestra-like sound.

Toward “Lonely Eyes,” the song is slower here than the rest of the album.  This track focuses less on instrumentals and more on guitar and vocals to set the tone to the emotion-grabbing ballad.

There are neat interplays between the strumming of the guitar to the blaring vocals from the lead singer.  Listeners will see how The Departure crosses different genres of music through the help of DeBlanc.

Ironically, like their band name, The Departure have a flare for entering and leaving a song.  Like in their EP closer, “Thoughts,” the track opens up with sporadic intersperses of screaming on DeBlanc and Proesch’s part.  The song more or less fades out into oblivion, savoring the band’s departure.

Their template of hard work and uplifting crossover rock music with elements of punk and metal works.  This has allowed for them to own their own sound, instead of tapering off sounds from other bands they work with.  Their music is uniquely theirs and is a great find for someone looking for more edgy pop music.