Hurst

You can tell a lot by the company you keep. Four-piece pop rockers Hurst have shared stages with groups like Nickelback, Default and Theory of a Deadman. "Holy shit,” you might say, "They sure did open for a lot of really bad, personality-less Canadian rock!” So what does it say about Hurst? Do they fit into the same verse-chorus-verse fridge buzz as all of the above? Remove the post-grunge Vedder-isms and the answer is, unfortunately, "yeah.” On the Wanderlust EP, the band’s namesake Trevor Hurt spends far too much time tossing together a series of short, contrived rhyming couplets to let any of the tracks develop any momentum or poignancy. That they’re placed over the same tired pop rock chord progressions long since beaten to death by one-hit FM wonders doesn’t help matters any either. The good news? Hurst are far less outright annoying than any of the bands they’ve opened for and at least have the option, if not some of the ability (beyond this EP’s tracks, at least), of growing into a worthwhile act. But I’m not sure I’d call that a recommendation for this release, as such.