­The Asylum Chorus is back combining their a capella style with the laid back, street-funk, electric church mood of New Orleans with their fourth full release Take A Piece. Released on November 15 and recorded at Esplanade Studios, Take A Piece is a display of the Asylum Chorus’s diverse style: a modern, more informed interpretation of acapella combined with funk and rock influences. Take A Piece also features a positive social message, but is not berating with its delivery. On the contrary, the songs remain balanced and laid back, even when the Asylum Chorus strays away from its a capella roots.

Take A Piece is a 6-track album that is an energetic taste of pleasant vocal melodies and songs that are unexpectedly easy to sing along to. Almost every song on the album is written by a different band member demonstrating the variety of their catalogue, yet the songs all belong together and while the release is short coming in at around 18 minutes, the Asylum Chorus’ Take A Piece is an easy and pleasant listen. It starts with the highly energized rocking 'Make This World Better,' but then makes way for the more laid-back soulful catchy sound with 'Sway You.' Their definitive a capella style comes to full fruition with the snappy title track, 'Take A Piece.' 'Almost Time' focuses around an acapella vocal melody and then builds dynamically making way for the chorus to take over the song. Amy Trail’s 'I Want To Love You So Much' is a laid back roots-soul with another catchy chorus that’s a relaxing, pleasant song that subdues the more serious of message of the last track, 'Living In.' The last track explores the struggles of everyday life as they continue to exist in modern society through the Asylum Chorus’s well practiced a capella voicings, and its placement within the album gives the album more substance in its message, but does so in a way that’s not abrasive or alienating because of its pleasant songs.

The Asylum Chorus’s Take A Piece is available digitally through their BandCamp page. You can see them locally on December 9 at 30/90, December 15 at Maison, or December 30 at Ace Hotel.

http://www.theasylumchorus.com/

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