Harrisonburg band //Panoramic puts new spin on instrumental music

If you thought instrumental music was just for DeeJays, jazz combos and jam bands, think again.

"It’s All Too Quiet," the latest release from the Harrisonburg band //Panoramic, proves that you don’t need vocals to rock. With seven tracks, most of which are over five minutes long and include complex melodies and chord progressions, this release will undoubtedly appeal to the more experimentally inclined ears of the indie set.

After about 15 seconds of what listeners can assume is a plane taking off, the second track begins. The track,"Pinwheels," explodes into a bass-heavy riff with distorted melodies, reminiscent of At The Drive In’s later work.

"Pinwheels" startles listeners with hard-rock harmony, most often while they are still trying to figure out whether to pronounce the two slashes in the band’s name. Track two kickstarts six tracks of music that seem to blend together into one long piece of carefully calculated noise.

The true power of this CD lies in the suspense created by pounding bass lines and gradually increasing volume levels, which then open up into big, thick chords complimented by crashing cymbals. //Panoramic’s clamorous quality is best displayed in "The Rise and Fall of a Small European Nation," a track worthy both of art galleries and moshpits that starts calmly before ripping into melodic hardcore without screaming.

Band members Doug Stanford, Wes Webb, T.J. Ill, and Joel Mills recorded "It’s All Too Quiet" in our own Grafton-Stovall Theatre — a fitting venue for a band composed entirely of JMU students, according to //Panoramic’s management.

Stanford and Webb describe their sound as being "cultivated in the beautiful mistakes which we strive to capture in our songwriting." If this is true, the mistakes made in Grafton during those sessions generated an impressive release.

For more information on //Panoramic, visit the band’s Web site, www.panoramicnoise.com, to sample the new CD, find information on upcoming shows and view pictures of the band members.