With a voice like Paramore’s Hayley Williams and a sound like the music of Evanescence, Rose of Jericho has brilliantly combined two important and unique elements of music. Their debut album, These City Lights, has a melodramatic -- and at times, angry – sound with poignant, heartbreaking, and easily relatable lyrics. The album begins with the song, Buried Cold, in which the lead singer, Andrea Russie, is accompanied by a set of guitar, bass, and drum players. She beautifully screams, “how can I say it so you’ll understand/I’d scream until it hurts but it’d be of no use/cause I don’t mean much more to you/ than that passive smile on your face/and in every empty glass/ I start to see reflections of you inside/ and I know you see through me/ I’ve known every step of the way” out of anger and heart ache. This first track and many of the others on the album are typical of your wounded-lead-girl-singer band. Some of the other songs are more like ballads. Think of the random, My Immortal track on Evanescence’s album, Fallen. These tracks, which include the final track, Hesitation, are accompanied by piano, which Russie plays herself. In this song, she asks if it is too much if she “wanted you to stay.” This final track is like a summarization of the album as most of the songs address relationships and what appears to be a breakup. In Lucid Dreamer, she gently sings, “I’m so tired of being the shadow lining the wall/ watching every memory of you departing from me/ searching the windows and corridors for traces of me.” It is as though she has lost herself in this relationship…in this song…in this album…only to find herself in music. And find herself, she did. This album was amazingly written, recorded, and produced. Definitely a great new band to add to the list, which, of course, includes the likes of Paramore, Evanesence, Damone, etc. You won’t be disappointed. I swear. --Abigail Thornton