Biography

After an extended hiatus, California’s No Bragging Rights have returned with their first new music since 2014’s The Concrete Flower. Like that record, this self-titled EP is being released on Pure Noise, which actually put out the band’s 2009 album, The Consequence Of Dreams. Now comprised of vocalist Mike Perez, who started the band in 1999, Martin Alcedo (drums/vocals), Daniel Garrow (guitar/vocals) and Anthony ‘Tron’ Laur (guitar). “When we were first brainstorming ideas,” says Alcedo, “we all agreed we wanted it to sound nostalgic, so people know they’re still listening to NBR, but we also wanted to elevate it to the best of our ability. It’s got some of our heaviest stuff, some of our most emotional stuff and some of the most technically challenging stuff, but it’s still classic NBR.” Indeed, one of the most recognizable NBR traits is in full force here – that trademark attitude of resilience and defiance that has defined the band from the very beginning. That manifests itself both in the way these surging, energizing melodies combine crunching riffs and soaring guitars, the clean and unclean vocals battling each other across a blistering sonic soundscape, but also with the lyrics, which dive deeper than ever before into the world of mental health. Partly, that’s the band emphatically doubling down on their identity for this re-introduction to the world, but it’s also representative of changes that have occurred since the last album came out.