Silverstein

From their ambitious, ten-year celebrating, four-album spanning string of shows at Toronto, ON's El Mocambo, Burlington, ON's pop-core poster boys Silverstein compiled the performances and made a 22-track live album (with accompanying DVD) that sounds pretty much as one would expect a live Silverstein album to sound. Polished and without any big surprises, the album runs almost entirely chronologically, showing the evolution of the band's sound from straight-up screamo playing, Grade-loving kids into the slightly more varied pop punk tendencies that became most notable on 2007's Arrivals and Departures. With audio recorded by music/engineering vets Jag Tanna and Scott Komer, the sound is crystal clear and does an admirable job showcasing the band's near pitch-perfect instrumentation and dynamics, however predictable they may be. Later material from last year's concept album, A Shipwreck in the Sand, especially "Born Dead," with guest vocals from original Comeback Kid front-man Scott Wade, best combines the band's varying sounds and most successfully conveys the transformation the songs take in a live setting. It could really do without the unfortunate "Are you ready, Toronto?!"-type clichés spouted by singer Shane Told, but Decade is a document by and for the people who know this trade and do it well.