thePULSEBy Jillian Locke
Power pop-punk dynamo Madina Lake have kicked their game up a notch with their second effort for Roadrunner Records, Attics to Eden; it is, simply put, bursting with fruit flavor ~ Fruit Stripe gum fruit flavor, even! And with the help of producer David Bendeth (Paramore, Red Jumpsuit Apparatus, Killswitch Engage, Breaking Benjamin), Madina Lake came to grips with themselves and their music to make their most eclectic, forcefully solid effort to date.
Madina Lake compiles all the usual elements of a pop-punk album: epic tempo, soaring guitars laden with poppy, gripping drums and lyrics that explore their innermost demons, feelings of desperation, and the journey that helped vocalist Nathan Leone, brother and guitarist Matthew Leone, bassist Mateo Camargo, and drummer Dan Torelli create Attics to Eden.
Swathed in surreal art work, Attics to Eden includes a CD booklet with an actual map of Madina Lake, a fictional town the band created to convey a greater, more myseterious message, right down to map keys labeling such locations as “Lila the Divine Cemetery,” “Body Found,” “Madina High School,” “Sapphire Square,” and “Lucille’s House.” Attics to Eden is the second installment of this story, which ML’s 2007 Roadrunner Release, From Them, Through Us, To You, began.
Tracks such as “Let’s Get Outta Here,” “Never Walk Alone,” “Welcome to Oblivion,” “Silent Voices Kill,” and their single and first video off the new album, “Never Take Us Alive,” paint an elusive, sonically pleasing, atmospheric tapestry of emotional evolution. For fans of Linkin Park, Muse, and Paramore, Madina Lake is storming the pop-punk world with force. Catch them at this year’s Warped Tour, and in the meantime, see if you can piece together the shards of their mystery.
