Flesh Lights Free Yourself

Guitarist/vocalist Max Vandever and cousin Elissa Ussery (drums/vocals) migrated from San Antonio and began their assault on Austin's live music dumps in 2008 playing as a duo under ill-advised names including but not limited to Candle Shop & The Psychic Reader, Dead Leger and Carousel Images. After poaching bassist/vocalist Jeremy Steen from an early lineup of The Gospel Truth, the newly dubbed Flesh Lights, the trio quickly became a fixture on whatever you-got-songs-in-my-punk / you-got-punk-in-my-songs circuit that began to coalesce around the alleged live music capital. A pile of records soon followed; 7"'s for Twistworthy and Super Secret, a killer debut album for the former imprint in the form of 2012's Muscle Pop, this past summer's "No Longer" single, etc. Pretty early on, this trio established themselves as being songcraft devotees without much self-consciousness. And while those of us who bought Muscle Pop consider it a bona fide classic, LP #2, Free Yourself functions as so much more than a sequel; the band claim they told producer Evan Kleinecke to make it sound like 'Heaven Tonight', but they could've thrown in the Exploding Hearts, Dictators, Only Ones or Teenage Fanclub while they were at it.