New.Old.Rare Midtown Primary Artist

This clever Fueled By Ramen release features tracks from four bands – three songs each from {|Midtown|}, {|Recover|}, SilentCorporation, and {|Blueline Medic|}. While it suffers a bit from the groups’ collective reliance on melodic hardcore and emo-ish pop-punk (it can occasionally be difficult for first-time listeners to tell them apart), New.Old.Rare will be a boon to fans for the very three reasons its title suggests. Australia’s Blueline Medic turns in a bold cover of Tori Amos’ Precious Things – this version’s by the numbers quiet/loud arrangement isn’t remarkable, but frontman Donnie Dureau does effectively convey some of the tension and creeping uneasiness of the Amos original. The gravelly Dureau is also a dead vocal ringer for {|Jets to Brazil|}’s {|Blake Schwarzenbach|}. Previously unreleased material includes an acoustic version of Get It Together from Midtown and Recover’s hard-edged Not a Word. While {|New.Old.Rare|} is pretty strong throughout, its best moments might come from SilentCorporation, whose passionate and positive dueling vocals and energetic, chunky power chording during Don’t Look Back and Trapped in Me keep things moving along at a breakneck, heartbreak-heavy pace.