One of Canada's secrets is out: The Rest. The band's new album, Everyone All At Once, features some of the best indie to cross the northern border so far this year.

The Rest successfully deliver on both ends of the spectrum of pop rock music - there are great songs that make you want to get up and move and others that are so beautiful you want to swoon. For example, "Walk On Water" has a driving, Arcade Fire-like march swirling around pop rock guitars and completed by one of Canada's best indie rock vocalists, Adam Bentley.

Then you take a song like "Apples & Allergies" - its odd name disguising the elegant and calming notes that match perfectly with the other side of Bentley's voice - rich, textured and soothing. The album is full of harmonies, melodies and day-dream symphonies. Other memorable songs include "Modern Time Travel", "Blossom Babies Part Two" and "Phonetically Phonetic".

"This is an album that we feel as strongly about each and every track," Bentley wrote on the Indiecater Records' web site. "In a world of expanding music more focused on the quick instant pleasures, we hope that you can completely fall into these pieces, finding new ways to listen, and varied interpretations around each word, tone, rhythm and melody."

After listening to Everyone All At Once a few times, Bentley's wish seems attainable, especially for fans of Canadian orchestrated indie pop, which has played a big role in fueling the popularity of indie music worldwide in recent years. The Rest can now put themselves in the forefront of the second wave of this phenomenon.

The talented young musicians who make up The Rest include Anna Jarvis, Blake Bowman, Dwayne Brydon, Jordan Mitchell, Matty Buzanko and Steve Jones. The only thing the band doesn't have going for it is the name; come on, The Rest?! With so much talent, why couldn't they have come up with a better, more unique name than that? Regardless, the bottom line is: Everyone All At Once is one of the best surprise indie albums of 2009.

"Walk On Water" - The Rest from Everyone All At Once (2009)

"Apples & Allergies" - The Rest from Everyone All At Once (2009)

Stream Everyone All At Once
The Rest Official Site
The Rest on MySpace

Labels: New Releases