There was a point in high school where The Matches were my favorite band in the world, hard stop, no doubt about it. I loved the fact that they were a local band (they hailed from Oakland, CA), I loved the fact that their live show was absolutely electric (I had the chance to catch them multiple times, including once with the Plain White T’s), and I loved how they took the classic pop punk tropes and sort of flipped them on their head just a bit to give their sound a little bit of an experimental flair while still remaining within the confines of the genre (a trend that would see them branch out even more creatively in subsequent albums).
But most of all I loved how The Matches (and especially lead singer Shawn Harris) captured the simmering boil of teen angst and that feeling of living in a place where absolutely nothing happens. If there’s one thing that the pop punk genre does well across the board is make safe suburbia feel like the worst place on Planet Earth you could ever imagine, a prison that you can’t wait to get out of. As you age this becomes a somewhat silly concept to imagine (and one you largely recognize as such), but in those fiercely burning moments of youth it feels so absolutely real. And throughout the course of E. Von Dahl Killed The Locals the band wields this version of their truth like a sharpened blade, slicing and dicing their way to self realization and a feeling of triumphant achievement. Whether The Matches or I was running from something or towards something at that moment in our lives is unimportant– what matters was that we were seemingly on that journey together. And that’s the bond I (and countless other fans) had with them.
These things have come full circle of course, as they always seem to do. Lead singer Shawn Harris is now an award-winning author and illustrator for children’s books and I’m out here writing punk rock covers of traditional kid’s nursery rhymes. It’s funny where you end up after you see what’s beyond the tall grass that grows around your town.
Standout Songs: “More Than Local Boys”, “Chain Me Free”, “Dog-Eared Page”, “The Restless”, “Sick Little Suicide”, “Scratched Out”
