Let’s get down to it. Claiming Neptune’s self-titled EP is a straight line affair replete with the kind of big city basement riff based rock that was the basis of the career of many an aspiring band back in the days when going large didn’t mean adding more fries to your order.
To some, that will make the music of this Texas based band another example of sounds long since sampled and soundtracked into movies about growing up in a time conveniently forgotten by those who weren’t actually there at the time. Yet, in these revivalist times, points have to be scored for taking an honest approach to the serious business of capturing the attention of the music buying public with Lisa Borjon’s laconic vocals seasoning these five songs with a superficially casual indifference that nearly hides the underlying, all pervading, sense of downbeat drama. If you like marking off score cards, “Higher and Higher” scores almost as many points as “In Time” in the grunge influences contest.
You get what you get with Claiming Neptune and this EP might well get them some deserved attention.