The self-proclaimed pop punk band Thre3 have released their debut cd, a ten song collection of guitar driven punk and pop punk tracks that would provide a nice soundtrack for the  sunny summer days of my youth…

Some may know a bit about Richmond, Virginia and its ties to music, especially metal heavyweights like Lamb of God, Municipal Waste, and the always entertaining Gwar.  From a genre standpoint, this has little to do with Thre3 as they have more in common with local musicians like Navaeh and True Liberty, but does highlight the history of good music coming from Richmond.  About  five years ago Thre3 got their start as the pop-punk cover band Penguin Juice with just Keith Donovan Burket and Noah Carroll.  After a year or so, Noah felt the band needed to move to a more Christian direction and Don Carroll joined the band on bass with Keith moving to drums, Noah to vocals, and a name change to 70×7.  Not until September of 2017 did the band’s name change to the current Thre3.  The band wrote most of the songs on Do or Die within the last year and recorded with a friend of theirs, Eddie Payne at his studio, the Sound Garage in Richmond.

Right from the start Thre3 have a great start and live feel to the recording.  There’s a muted guitar strum followed by a chord that rings out into near feedback before a fast bass and drum line come in followed by a somewhat aggressive tone on the guitar.  The underlying rhythm to the song bounces along and the guitar which is a bit heavy for a pop punk song carries the bulk of the song.  From a production perspective everything has that rough punk rock feel to it, a bit more than one would expect from pop punk but it works.  Noah’s vocals convey that somewhat awkward nature often found in pop punk songs, so that part works as well and “All This Noise” has the general elements expected in a pop punk song.  Good tune.

“Right to Feel” keeps with the same general formula but the guitars are a bit more muted in parts and the vocals more spoken than sung.  Either way, the guitar is really driving the song here and the somewhat rough aggressive tone keeps my interest.  While this isn’t an epic progressive metal song, there is some quality songcraft here and the songs have that familiar feel to them.

“Wallflower” follows the same general trend of the previous songs but “I Know” opens with just clean guitar and vocals and while a decent song moves away from the edgier material on the album.  “Because” and “Consolation Prize” could be the equivalent of a power ballad if pop punk bands did them…maybe they do, just not my thing at all with “Consolation Prize” shifting all the way to acoustic.

Thankfully for my ears, mixed in with the more ballad and clean or acoustic guitar dominated songs are “Meghann and Wren” and “Set Up for Failure” both of which revert back to that more aggressive guitar and feature some cool riffs and chord progressions.

Thre3 have pulled together some great punk rock songs and mixed in some more poppy punk songs on Do or Die, with the poppier ones, just not working for me, but then again, I also tend to listen to more metal these days than punk so probably not surprising.  Either way, the album is a fun listen, reminds me of summer, punk rock, and growing up and it’s always great to hear a new band that sounds like they’re having fun in the songs.  Check ‘em out…

Written by John Jackson

Rating: 7/10

Tracklist
1. All This Noise
2. Right to Feel
3. Wallflower
4. I Know
5. Because
6. Mehann and Wren
7. Waste
8. Consolation Prize
9. Blue Jay Walking
10. Set Up for Failure

Band Members
Noah Carroll – Guitar/Vocals
Don Carroll – Bass
Keith Donovan Burket – Drums/Vocals

Record Label: Raven Faith Records

Release Date: Jan. 20th. 2018

Weblinks: Band site / Facebook / Bandcamp

Video for “Do or Die” promo