After five years of living in a musical dormant state as Florida I’ve made my way back home to Texas, my birth state.  It’s not all stereotypical country and blues to be had here as served by my recent discovery of Dallas’ Badenders.  I discovered them for the first time in Denton home to the University of North Texas.  They play a type of rock that you can listen in a chilled out introspective position one minute then make you go and get ready for the dance clubs the next. Listening to their debut offering’ Driving’   you get that feeling. 

                                                                                   

Their layered sound owes debts to bands such as New Order, The Cure, and Coldplay as evidenced on the lead off track ‘ New and Improved;’ recall the harmonies of Pink Floyd but in a much more updated and indie rock mode on ‘Cry for Help.’  Then you want to raise the roof and your arms as you shimmy to the dance rock of  ‘Masquerade;’ and to end it all you can revisit and pine for those lost days of innocence and childhood with the pensive Eno-esque ‘The Lights.’  There’s an amazing amount of talent and originality given that 3/4 of the band have just hit the legal drinking age, but what does that matter?: As long as Badenders are the pilots of a new musical optimism that is not readily found these days, we should all take the time to explore a new frontier in Texas.

www.myspace.com/badenders