Consider the band’s signature play: a three-guitar attack which stacks raw immediacy with large-scale aspirations. Sometimes this arrangement is abrasive. The chorus on Two Beers In, a track detailing the internal conversations of a partygoer, seethes with rage. Other times it’s more nuanced; How I Got My Shrunken Head finds elastic guitar lines tripping over one another before fading out with a delicate ring. What connects these two different threads is Cory Castro’s frayed vocals, gaining their power from a violent shout and their confessions from a measured whimper. Combine that range with a set of lyrical themes that play out like an uneasy three-way phone call and what remains -- their 2014 LP Those Days Are Gone -- fills speakers with a darkness offset by instrumentals which sway and bend with warm nostalgia.  

 

But what fills most of Free Throw’s golden playbook is a commitment to winning their own way. After strings of DIY touring circuits and an intense love affair with their van, it’s clear to see their blooming, road-tested legacy answers to no one but their enthusiastic audiences. With their live sets packing rooms across the country, not without alcohol and crowd sing-alongs in tow, it seems this grind has paid off so far, with the grit packing their songs with not just unrelenting talent, but the forward-thinking energy to match.