Review: TRAPT – TRAPT Live!

TRAPT’s third major label release, TRAPT Live!, is pretty much the standard live album fare with a collection of live tracks from the band’s two Warner Bros. releases including the successful singles “Headstrong”; and “Stillframe”;, but the real draw is the band’s first new studio single in nearly two years, “Stay Alive”;.

The band’s self titled release was seen by some, including myself, as a capitalization on the post-grunge sound made famous at the end of the 1990’s and early into this millennium, it didn’t really offer anything new, or bring anything substantially better to the table, but it went along at its own pace. Vocalist Chris Brown was keen to yell at us in “Headstrong”; but the band was also able to capture audiences with the infectious sound of “Stillframe”; (still this reviewer’s personal favorite track from the band). A maturing of the band could be seen in their second release, Someone in Control, but its here, with “Stay Alive”; that the band really begins to hit its stride and break out of the sophomore curse.

Proving that they aren’t a one hit wonder, TRAPT’s latest singles, previously only available on the band’s MySpace page, certainly cements them back into the rock scene with hard hitting guitars and Brown’s unmistakable voice in a state between outright yelling and his indoor voice.

The CD, however, is a pretty generic recording of only nine live tracks, which seems on the short side of things where other live albums, like Reel Big Fish’s Our Live Album is Better than Your Live Album continue on for nearly 30. Looking at the track times, the Live performance isn’t any more than a 40 minute set. Granted TRAPT doesn’t have the back catalog that bands like RBF have, but with two studio albums, and two indie albums before they were signed, I think fans might be expecting a bit more from the quartet.

In some respects the disc may be just a filler to put the new singles out there for the mainstream and hold everyone over until the release of the band’s upcoming studio album due to street in March 2008.