Paul Masson - bass guitar, lead vox
  Al Pacheco - guitars, backing vox
  Ben Pranger - guitars, backing vox

  “Their style of punk-infused college rock is just the ticket in today’s industry”—J. H. U. Newsletter
  
   It’s hard to be unique in the music world today. So many bands emerge as the next Ramones, the next Rolling Stones, the next AC/DC. Has originality been dead since Johnny Marr left the Smiths? Can a young band only hope to sift through the past in order to find their sound? Perhaps, but The Hypocrites are a band who recognize the difference between honoring their influences and stealing The Glitter Twins’ act.
  
   In March 2002, three bookish Johns Hopkins University graduates decided to put their prestigious degrees to good use and start a rock n’ roll band. Sparked from the cinders of the fiery train wreck that was their previous outfit (garage act From the Hip), Paul Masson, Al Pacheco, and Ben Pranger sought to explore a wider range of musical influences and hone their songwriting into a mature, melodic blend. Eager to commit these new ideas to tape, the Baltimore-based band took to Manhattan’s Dampcellar Studios. Teamed with the production duo of Carmen Yates and Thor Johnsson, The Hypocrites hoped to emerge from these sessions with a decent enough demo to land them better gigs. What came out of those Summer 2002 sessions, however, was something much more substantial. Faced with the challenge of finding an identity for each individual song, and continually pushed to the limits of their musical vocabulary by Yates and Johnsson, the band had soon transformed five acoustic demos into five fully realized and fully distinctive rock songs.
  
  From the tongue-in-cheek lyrics and soaring guitars of opener “Whipping Boy” to the folk-blues outro of “50/50,” The Hypocrites EP runs the gamut of rock music. Filling out the recording are possible radio singles “In Secret” and “Specter,” the former a rather thoughtful lyrical contemplation complete with swirling guitars from Pranger and Pacheco, the latter a centerpiece of balladry and bombast fleshed out by the at once vulnerable and cocksure voice of Paul Masson. Thrown into the mix for some good punk-rock fun is “Nonsense,” a power-chord romp driven ahead by Masson’s thumping bass and a retro synth line.
  
  Now armed with a professional EP worthy of radio airplay, the band returned to Baltimore and set about translating The Hypocrites-on-tape into The Hypocrites-onstage. Like their EP, a Hypocrites show takes the audience on a trip from the peaks of punk-rock noise to the valleys of delicate, crafted songwriting, all the while providing an outlet for the band’s ever-growing backlog of new material. Planning to make a career in the music business, Masson, Pranger, and Pacheco hope for the opportunity to record this new material and take it on the road to as many people as possible.
  
  
  
  www.thehypocritesband.com
  

 ·50/50
 ·In Secret
 ·Nonsense
 ·Spectre
 ·Whipping Boy