{"id":39228,"date":"2018-04-05T16:00:09","date_gmt":"2018-04-05T15:00:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/?p=39228"},"modified":"2023-02-02T08:54:33","modified_gmt":"2023-02-02T08:54:33","slug":"review-the-wonder-years-sister-cities","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/review-the-wonder-years-sister-cities\/","title":{"rendered":"Review: The Wonder Years &#8211; Sister Cities"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignleft size-medium wp-image-92177\" src=\"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/The-Wonder-Years-Sister-Cities-300x300.jpeg\" alt=\"The Wonder Years Sister Cities\" width=\"300\" height=\"300\" title=\"\" srcset=\"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/The-Wonder-Years-Sister-Cities-300x300.jpeg 300w, https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/The-Wonder-Years-Sister-Cities-100x100.jpeg 100w, https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/The-Wonder-Years-Sister-Cities-465x465.jpeg 465w, https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/The-Wonder-Years-Sister-Cities-500x500.jpeg 500w, https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/The-Wonder-Years-Sister-Cities.jpeg 600w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/>Despite the ease with which we can communicate today, the distance between one another feels bigger than it actually is. On <em>&#8216;Sister Cities&#8217;<\/em>, <a href=\"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/tag\/the-wonder-years\/\"><strong>The Wonder Years<\/strong><\/a> aim to remind us of that. The Philadelphia sextet have built a career on writing heartfelt modern pop-punk anthems. Yet with every passing record, <strong>TWY<\/strong> have grown further away from the typical genre tropes. Nevertheless, <em>&#8216;Sister Cities&#8217;<\/em> is their most expansive and refined work to date.<\/p>\n<p>Throughout, the band&#8217;s travels weave in and out of the record&#8217;s lyrical spine. Campbell&#8217;s tales of absent loved ones (see<em> &#8216;Raining in Kyoto&#8217;<\/em>), both past and present, shapes<em> &#8216;Sister Cities&#8217;<\/em> into a lyrically absorbing record.<\/p>\n<p>With such a deep, thought-provoking set of songs, TWY stylistically continue to grow with a handful of layered, sombre songs.\u00a0<em>&#8216;Flowers Where Your Face Should Be&#8217;<\/em> gently treads along a swooning romantic tone.<em> &#8216;We Look Like Lightning&#8217;<\/em> ominously opens with electronic drums and Campbell&#8217;s repetition of <em>\u201cWhat Song Do You Wanna Die <\/em>To<em>?\u201d<\/em> complimenting the torpid, mournful instrumentation.<\/p>\n<p><iframe title=\"The Wonder Years - Sister Cities (Official Music Video)\" width=\"800\" height=\"450\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/ccIyBeLEjGM?feature=oembed&#038;enablejsapi=1&#038;origin=https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture; web-share\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>&#8216;<em>Sister Cities&#8217;<\/em> isn&#8217;t a complete stylistic 180\u00b0 for <strong>TWY<\/strong> as songs such as <em>&#8216;Heavens Gate (Sad &amp; Sober)&#8217;<\/em>, <em>&#8216;The Ghosts of Right Now&#8217;<\/em> and <em>&#8216;The Orange Grove&#8217;<\/em> are delivered with urgency and a sense of familiarity for longtime fans. Whereas &#8216;It Must Get Lonely&#8217; opens with earthly bounce before Campbell emphatically speaks to someone who refuses to change their ways.<\/p>\n<p>However, the best moment comes in the form of <em>&#8216;The Ocean Grew Hands to Hold Me&#8217;<\/em>. A compelling, heart-aching finale, it captures Campbell at his most exposed. Gradually building over the course of six minutes, reverb guitars, thick sparse drums and cathartic keys compliment his remorseful words. The pay off comes as he admits <em>&#8220;I miss everyone at once, but most of all,\u00a0I miss the ocean.&#8221;<\/em><\/p>\n<p>The absence of loved ones has\u00a0hugely affected Campbell and company, yet it has allowed them to grow as songwriters and as musicians with startling results.<em> &#8216;Sister Cities&#8217;<\/em> may not be on par with admired previous outings, yet it has set the benchmark for an increasingly special band.<\/p>\n<p>4.5\/5<\/p>\n<p><iframe title=\"Spotify Embed: Sister Cities\" style=\"border-radius: 12px\" width=\"100%\" height=\"352\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen allow=\"autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; fullscreen; picture-in-picture\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/open.spotify.com\/embed\/album\/7yJeilesTxseeVpN6FUzYh?utm_source=oembed\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><em>&#8216;Sister Cities\u2019<\/em>\u00a0by\u00a0<strong>The Wonder Years<\/strong>\u00a0is released on 6th April on\u00a0<strong>Hopeless Records<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p><strong>The Wonder Years<\/strong>\u00a0links:\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.thewonderyearsband.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Website<\/a>|<a href=\"http:\/\/facebook.com\/thewonderyearsband\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Facebook<\/a>|<a href=\"http:\/\/twitter.com\/thewonderyears\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Twitter<\/a>|<a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/thewonderyearsband\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Instagram<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Words by S\u00eaan Reid (<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/SeanReid86\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">@SeanReid86<\/a>)<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&#8220;&#8216;Sister Cities&#8217; may not be on par with admired previous outings, yet it has set the benchmark for an increasingly special band.&#8221;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":92177,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[5879,246,12398,15039,928],"class_list":["post-39228","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-album-reviews","tag-album-reviews","tag-hopeless-records","tag-sean-reid","tag-sister-cities","tag-the-wonder-years"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.7 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Review: The Wonder Years - Sister Cities - Already Heard Staging<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"&quot;&#039;Sister Cities&#039; may not be on par with admired previous outings, yet it has set the benchmark for an increasingly special band.&quot;\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"noindex, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_GB\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Review: The Wonder Years - Sister Cities - Already Heard Staging\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"&quot;&#039;Sister Cities&#039; may not be on par with admired previous outings, yet it has set the benchmark for an increasingly special band.&quot;\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/review-the-wonder-years-sister-cities\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Already Heard Staging\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/AlreadyHeard\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:author\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/seanreidportfolio\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2018-04-05T15:00:09+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2023-02-02T08:54:33+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/The-Wonder-Years-Sister-Cities.jpeg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"600\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"600\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"S\u00eaan Reid\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@alreadyhearduk\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@alreadyhearduk\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"S\u00eaan Reid\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Estimated reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Review: The Wonder Years - Sister Cities - Already Heard Staging","description":"\"'Sister Cities' may not be on par with admired previous outings, yet it has set the benchmark for an increasingly special band.\"","robots":{"index":"noindex","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"og_locale":"en_GB","og_type":"article","og_title":"Review: The Wonder Years - Sister Cities - Already Heard Staging","og_description":"\"'Sister Cities' may not be on par with admired previous outings, yet it has set the benchmark for an increasingly special band.\"","og_url":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/review-the-wonder-years-sister-cities\/","og_site_name":"Already Heard Staging","article_publisher":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/AlreadyHeard\/","article_author":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/seanreidportfolio","article_published_time":"2018-04-05T15:00:09+00:00","article_modified_time":"2023-02-02T08:54:33+00:00","og_image":[{"width":600,"height":600,"url":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/The-Wonder-Years-Sister-Cities.jpeg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"S\u00eaan Reid","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@alreadyhearduk","twitter_site":"@alreadyhearduk","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"S\u00eaan Reid","Estimated reading time":"2 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/review-the-wonder-years-sister-cities\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/review-the-wonder-years-sister-cities\/"},"author":{"name":"S\u00eaan Reid","@id":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/#\/schema\/person\/484dc00e54dea89663d06cb624a70cd9"},"headline":"Review: The Wonder Years &#8211; Sister Cities","datePublished":"2018-04-05T15:00:09+00:00","dateModified":"2023-02-02T08:54:33+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/review-the-wonder-years-sister-cities\/"},"wordCount":391,"commentCount":0,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/#organization"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/review-the-wonder-years-sister-cities\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/The-Wonder-Years-Sister-Cities.jpeg","keywords":["Album Reviews","Hopeless Records","Sean Reid","Sister Cities","The Wonder Years"],"articleSection":["Album Reviews"],"inLanguage":"en-GB","potentialAction":[{"@type":"CommentAction","name":"Comment","target":["https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/review-the-wonder-years-sister-cities\/#respond"]}]},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/review-the-wonder-years-sister-cities\/","url":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/review-the-wonder-years-sister-cities\/","name":"Review: The Wonder Years - Sister Cities - Already Heard Staging","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/review-the-wonder-years-sister-cities\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/review-the-wonder-years-sister-cities\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/The-Wonder-Years-Sister-Cities.jpeg","datePublished":"2018-04-05T15:00:09+00:00","dateModified":"2023-02-02T08:54:33+00:00","description":"\"'Sister Cities' may not be on par with admired previous outings, yet it has set the benchmark for an increasingly special band.\"","inLanguage":"en-GB","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/review-the-wonder-years-sister-cities\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-GB","@id":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/review-the-wonder-years-sister-cities\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/The-Wonder-Years-Sister-Cities.jpeg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/04\/The-Wonder-Years-Sister-Cities.jpeg","width":600,"height":600,"caption":"The Wonder Years Sister Cities"},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/#website","url":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/","name":"Already Heard Staging","description":"Covering the best in alternative music as best as we can","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-GB"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/#organization","name":"Already Heard","url":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-GB","@id":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/11\/AH-relaunch-logo-white-bg.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/11\/AH-relaunch-logo-white-bg.jpg","width":500,"height":500,"caption":"Already Heard"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"},"sameAs":["https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/AlreadyHeard\/","https:\/\/x.com\/alreadyhearduk","https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/alreadyheard\/","https:\/\/www.linkedin.com\/company\/already-heard\/","https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/user\/AlreadyHeardMusic","https:\/\/tiktok.com\/@alreadyhearduk","https:\/\/www.threads.net\/@alreadyheard"]},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/#\/schema\/person\/484dc00e54dea89663d06cb624a70cd9","name":"S\u00eaan Reid","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-GB","@id":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/ef81976bb8e011af71a662b656189e99562e2fa47bb3928dfb824b97e133334e?s=96&d=mm&r=g","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/ef81976bb8e011af71a662b656189e99562e2fa47bb3928dfb824b97e133334e?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/ef81976bb8e011af71a662b656189e99562e2fa47bb3928dfb824b97e133334e?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"S\u00eaan Reid"},"description":"Based in Nottinghamshire, S\u00eaan Reid is the Founder and Senior Editor of Already Heard. Since 2008, he has been writing about a variety of bands from around the world for numerous publications. Away from music, S\u00eaan has several interests, most notably watching wrestling and football. You can find S\u00eaan on the following: Twitter | Facebook | Instagram","sameAs":["https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging","https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/seanreidportfolio","seanreid86"],"url":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/author\/sean\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39228","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=39228"}],"version-history":[{"count":15,"href":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39228\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":92179,"href":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39228\/revisions\/92179"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/92177"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=39228"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=39228"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=39228"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}