New Brunswick five-piece's polished poignancy is a beacon in the New Jersey alt community
NEW BRUNSWICK -- When Kevin Dye relocated from Michigan to Brooklyn a few years ago, he was fascinated by the big city's disconnect.
"There's so many people you see everyday, walking or on the subway, and you have no idea what their lives are like," Dye says in a recent interview.
The singer for New Brunswick's burgeoning post-rock outfit Gates employed that sense of detachment to suggest, on the band's striking new LP, that "all we seem to be are parallel lives caught crossing."
The lyric punctuates "Parallel Lives," a followup to the five-piece's highly successful 2015 debut "Bloom and Breathe," on California punk label Pure Noise Records. Though the group's introduction to the national alt scene topped 3 million plays of Spotify alone, they did their best this time to write as though no one would listen.
"We've always treated the band as this big, collaborative art project," bassist Mike Maroney says. "We tried not to allow outside factors influence what we were making. We were just trying to write the best songs possible, even though we didn't want to stray too far from our original path."
Since 2010, the band has excelled in understatement, and produced poignant jams between traipsing guitars and a nebulous delivery from Dye.
And now, on tour with post-hardcore pounders Thrice and La Dispute, Gates is set to showcase "Parallel Lives," released June 3, at Starland Ballroom in Sayreville Saturday.
THE LINEUP
Vocals -- Kevin Dye, 30, of Brooklyn
Guitar -- Dan King, 28, of Hillsborough
Guitar -- Ethan Koozer, 29, of Bloomfield
Bass guitar -- Mike Maroney, 29, of North Brunswick
Drums -- Daniel Crapanzano, 24, of Holmdel
WHAT THEY SOUND LIKE
After the success of "Bloom and Breathe," the group's sophomore LP on Pure Noise is an exercise in exploration -- all aspects of the band's aura seem escalated. Dye's serene tone is more present on single "Habit" and "Shiver," perhaps the band's most accessible song to date, which climaxes with a sprawling guitar break that's reminiscent of Tom Morello's ultra-warped pings.
"We experimented with a lot of new instrumentation, manipulating guitars to the point where they no longer sound like guitars," Maroney says. "We were trying to push the boundaries of sounds we could come up with."
With such a focus on sonic expansion, bands risk venturing into the deep end of the dissonance pool. But like the album art designed by Maroney and guitarist Dan King, "Parallel Lives" is a vibrant, pleasing listen. Though a minimalist sort of devotion continues to be Gates' (stylized as "gates") preferred aesthetic, the richness of those "experimental" new guitar sounds pushes this band further.
Sometimes, more is more.
WHO THEY SOUND LIKE
Moving Mountains, Athletics, Caspian
WHY THEY MATTER
No band in New Jersey pulls off the ambient, post-rock sound with nearly as much polish as well as this group, and few acts enjoy as promising an immediate future. The stars seem to have aligned this summer -- the band releases a cranked-up LP from a reputable label in Pure Noise (Senses Fail, The Story So Far), and they open for the heaviest hitter so far in Thrice.
"It's been pretty surreal," Maroney says of the playing to rooms that hold several-thousand strong.
When the band swings through Sayreville this weekend --a dream gig at a sold-out Starland Ballroom (capacity 2,200) -- it will be a homecoming for one of the brightest alternative acts to emerge from New Brunswick in the last few years.
They may not make the Billboard charts, but fans of explorative groups like Thrice or Jersey's own Thursday should soon take notice.
WHERE YOU CAN SEE THEM
- June 17: The Fillmore, Philadelphia, with Thrice and La Dispute. Tickets are $23, available here.
- June 18: Starland Ballroom, Sayreville, with Thrice and La Dispute. Tickets are $24, available here.
Bobby Olivier may be reached at bolivier@njadvancemedia.com. Follow him on Twitter @BobbyOlivier. Find NJ.com on Facebook.