It’s January 2008. It’s been snowing since October 2007 and ain’t stopping any time soon.

There’s noise about this record called The Senor And The Queen, but mostly about track 2, “Wherefore Art Thou, Elvis?” I think I found “…Elvis?” on a Canadian music compilation. (MuchMusic? I could be completely wrong.) It was the only song I connected with that day. There was a woman I loved dearly and I needed to get away from her. To do so, I walked through a tiny Pennsylvania town and through ditches, up to an interstate, to a Dairy Queen.

I walked for a real long time.

And when I collapsed back into my chair in my apartment, after the two hours of unyielding snow with a brain freeze, I turned my desktop monitor back on and played “Wherefore Art Thou, Elvis?” another fifteen times.

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I want to fire July 2012 directly into the sun.

Steam rose off of an outlet mall fountain in D.C. metro area suburb. In Pittsburgh, it somehow got hotter.

That was my first vacation alone in a couple years. It went sour, to the point where when the Airbus touched down, I had the sinking feeling the time could have been better spent with a wide mouth bottle of Jim Bean staring at paint dry for a week straight.

And when I collapsed into my chair in my apartment, after five hours in transit, I turned my laptop back on and played “Here Comes My Man” another fifteen times.

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THE GASLIGHT ANTHEM has always felt like a major label band to me, so the move to Mercury changes nothing except the number of zeroes on the advance (they still do that with big cartoon style checks, right? Ed.). One is hard pressed to suggest the band sold out their roots of writing songs about the radio, driving and women by going to a major label and writing songs about the radio, driving and women. And that’s not to talk trash about Side One, XOXO or Sabot, but that’s what THE GASLIGHT ANTHEM has always aimed for on any budget. Darwyn Cooke once said that every artist has their place. THE GASLIGHT ANTHEM’s place is a couple years after The Big One, in a Corvette. (With the top rolled down and the radio going, of course.)

The production sounds LOUD and the recording otherwise spotless. Brendan O’Brien knows how to record rock bands and Handwritten’s choices play to his forte. Rosamilla’s drums sound clear and massive and on the end of “Biloxi Parish” there’s an almost palpable joy to him closing down the song. Going back to American Slang, I thought Ted Hutt’s production was great and it still is, but O’Brien’s has a richness that makes what precedes him sound thin by comparison.

But, around the edges, there’s moments of surprise. Maybe that HORRIBLE CROWES record dislodged something different in Fallon’s brain. “Here Comes My Man” is of course about saying goodbye to a woman you love, to finish and leave the conversation with one of your friends, but the obvious homosexual undercurrent is new and exciting in the neo-Puritan context band’s discography. Unsurprisingly, “Mulholland Drive” is the continuation of “Film Noir,” with a (and I use this word carefully) bitchin’ Alex Rosamilla lead never more than 15 seconds away. There’s a woman, somewhere, and this is new, Brian Fallon is doing her wrong.

Side two lurches to the finish line. “National Anthem” doesn’t entirely click, but the song preceding it, “Mae”, does. That said, “Mae” bears a striking resemblance to “Blue Jeans & White T-Shirts” as well as “We Did It When We Were Young.” But that’s not exactly criticism and more description. Handwritten isn’t the best thing they’ve done. These are certainly THE GASLIGHT ANTHEM’s strongest singles, but the songs surrounding them aren’t up to the same bar. I bought the iTunes deluxe version and “Blue Dahlia” is uneven, but the moments of jaw-slackening brilliance outshine the so-so portions, the TOM PETTY cover “You Got Lucky” sounds like Gaslight and “Teenage Rebellion” sounds like something cooked up quick at home by Brian Fallon. Their NIRVANA cover “Sliver” is well-intentioned, but unnecessary.

It’s Gaslight, and much as they might throw in another guitarist, or have discovered guitar leads acting as solos, THE GASLIGHT ANTHEM doesn’t change. I mean, if I’m being appropriately critical, the review would be:

THE GASLIGHT ANTHEM: IMPROVED FORMULA! NOW WITH 30% MORE ORGAN AND 75% MORE GUITAR SOLOS!

And that would be it. I could send it on in to our Dear Editor.

But that’s a little too quip-y. And it leaves something unsaid, that despite Fallon’s wholehearted embrace of cliche (“Too Much Blood” is a five minute song about a bleeding heart, putting words and then blood on the page) THE GASLIGHT ANTHEM does what it always does, which is suffuse the cliche with so much emotion that it’s difficult to resist. And each successive record, it happens again. They might be magicians. And that makes sense, up to a point. Magic’s really just misdirection with flourishes.

But the magic is in this: That with each release, THE GASLIGHT ANTHEM make the familiar seem fresh. And when you’ve got a trick like that, I’ll line up every time.