4 out of 5

Upon announcing the band’s hiatus in 2011, Long Beach quartet RX Bandits cited exhaustion with their more-than decade-long touring career, and the personal tolls of life on the road. Given the energy of their live show, which has attracted a worldwide cult following, it was an understandable decision.

But only three years later, RXB have reformed, played a nationwide tour to mark the 10th anniversary of their 2003 masterpiece The Resignation, and recorded a new album. The release of Gemini, Her Majesty marks a band shaking off the cobwebs and rediscovering a youthful energy despite years of shared maturation.

The record doesn’t push far into uncharted territory for the band, but instead draws upon many elements of their past work and distills them into eleven compact, accessible tracks. Gone are the seven-minute prog epics, the extended percussion breaks, the bombastic shred-trading between guitarists Matt Embree and Steve Choi, and most of the extreme, unpredictable mid-song time and dynamic shifts that marked their past few releases and their live performances.

Despite my initial misgivings at this new, simplified format, what Gemini lacks in exploration, it makes up in refinement. It's a change in approach attempted by so many bands that produced their best work straddling the line between experimentation and accessibility, before veering too far toward the latter (see dredg, Incubus, Codeseven, etc.). RXB has no need to further show off their chops for their own sake, and their songwriting hasn’t suffered in the absence of such a display.

The songs are packed with memorable hooks and grooves; the musicianship is as airtight as ever; and contrasted to the band’s last pre-hiatus record, Mandala, which at times suffered from a lack of cohesion, every song feels complete. While the majority of the songs are short and direct, the record’s overall vibe is a bit tough to nail down stylistically, as the band in general has been since it began moving away from their ska-punk roots with 2001’s Progress. The songs have nods to everything from Latin rock (opener “Ruby Cumulous”) to Reggaeton (“Meow Meow Space Tiger”) to frantic, funk-tinged post-hardcore (“1995”). In the lone exception to this upbeat, hook-driven approach, “Will You Be Tomorrow,” RXB dip into the dark, subdued psychedelic territory explored on earlier albums with songs like “Apparition” and “March of the Caterpillar.” This time however, the band works some subtle electronic embellishment into the mix, contributing to the downcast, foreboding feel of the record’s longest track. It’s a vibe not far removed from latest Glassjaw’s latest work on Coloring Book and marks the darkest moment in an otherwise uncharacteristically happy-sounding record.

With Gemini, RXB also finally seem comfortable with being a four-piece band, having shed their longtime horn section before Mandala, which they had started writing before that point. Choi and bassist Joe Troy have come into their own as backup singers, a role previously occupied in part by the departed brass players. The record also benefits from a level of studio polish uncommon to the post-Progress RXB, who have long touted their preference for recording albums live in the same room versus endless overdubbing.

While I personally would like their next record to again showcase the band pushing the limits of their creativity and technical prowess, Gemini is a welcome, if casual, addition to RXB’s catalog. It's good to see them back in action.

Here's a recent video they did with Audiotree, featuring several cuts from the new album. Check it out, it's awesome.

http://vimeo.com/104387041