10 Musicians You Love For The Wrong Album

5. The Gaslight Anthem - The ’59 Sound

What You SHOULD Love Them For: Sink Or Swim

The Gaslight Anthem carved out a cult following for themselves in the late ‘00s with a sound that borrowed from the likes of Bruce Springsteen, The Clash, Tom Petty, and Against Me! to create a sonic palette that was both resoundingly familiar and yet pleasingly fresh and exciting. The band arguably achieved their greatest success, both critically and commercially, with sophomore album The ’59 Sound, but it’s debut effort Sink or Swim that should really be held in the highest esteem.

The record is a lesson in soulful punk rock, combining the urgency and simplicity of the genre with a more nuanced, less aggressive approach. Brian Fallon’s voice is as powerful and rich as it is in the band’s later work, but there’s an edge to it that is sometimes shorn away as the production value increases and the ambitions of the group grew.

More than anything though, Sink or Swim is, like so many debut albums, the most concentrated, purest form of what you want The Gaslight Anthem to be. It’s the sort of music you might stumble across in a bar one night completely by accident and instantly fall in love with. It’s the sound of a gang of local heroes about to take on the world. More than anything though, it’s just a bloody good record that gets forgotten about far too often.