The Honors release debut EP

Formed in January, The Honors is off to a hot start. Already, the Boston-based indie rock band has opened for Blues Traveler at the Alive at Five Music Festival in Connecticut and performed at the Newport Folk Festival in Rhode Island. With the release of its debut EP, the band now has added an original recording to its resumé.

Although formed in Boston, The Honors has strong connections to the Seacoast music scene. Among the four-piece band’s members are drummer Jay Trikakis and bassist Roland Nicol, both of Portsmouth-based hip-hop ensemble The Press Project and other local groups. Trikakis, a Massachusetts native, met vocalist/guitarist Brandon Heisler in 2003 while both were studying at Regent’s College in London.

“We were introduced by a mutual friend who suggested we have a jam session,” Trikakis said in an email. “There was a jam spot at the college where students would play until the wee hours of the morning—you weren’t allowed to play during the day—and Brandon and I hit it off immediately.”

When they graduated, the pair vowed to one day form a band together in the United States. With Trikakis heading back to Boston and Heisler returning to his native West Virginia, however, the chances of fulfilling that promise seemed dim. Both performed separately for about two years, and Heisler eventually moved to Boston in pursuit of his dream. “It’s really quite amazing when I think about it. He had faith and would stop at nothing to make it reality,” Trikakis said.

Rounding out the band, Heisler brought on fellow West Virginian guitarist Andrew Bayardi, who was attending Berklee College of Music, and Trikakis reeled in Nicol. Buzz grew around the new group, and a July 25 show at Bourbon’s in Portsmouth received an enthusiastic response.

Recorded at Wolf Den Studio in Shrewsbury, Mass., “Ghosts” includes seven songs that total just under 30 minutes. The disc was recorded and produced by Jay’s brother Nick Trikakis, who also recorded Heisler’s 2006 solo album “Do Me In.”

The opening title track begins with a taut guitar sequence that escalates as Heisler’s assured vocals enter the picture. The melody mounts to a clamor of percussion that marks the arrival of an impassioned chorus. “But you don’t have an answer / For the wrong you have done / The words you don’t say / They will haunt your pretty little head / And the ghosts go, oh oh, / And the ghosts go, on and on,” Heisler sings.

The sound echoes alternative rock bands from decades past while maintaining a current edge. At its core, the guitar-driven Americana rock style beckons to mind U2, but adds discernible currents of more modern bands like The Black Keys and Cold War Kids, albeit with a bit less imagination.

The instrumentalists are solid, with Trikakis maintaining a fast, driving beat on drums and Nicol ably anchoring the bass notes. Bayardi sculpts the body of each song and dictates the sonic mood, instilling atmospheres of intensity or meditation. Heisler accompanies on acoustic guitar and utters his lyrics in a soaring and forceful voice that is worthy of radio stardom. Heisler wrote or co-wrote all the songs, sometimes splitting the byline with Trikakis or the whole band.

“Ghosts” ends on a morbid note with “Atom’s Eve,” an atomic bomb lament with metaphoric undertones. “All life was lost / All was dust and bones / I had tried my best to find them / They all lost their smiles,” Heisler sings.

Trikakis said he has had no trouble transitioning between The Honors’ indie rock sound and The Press Project’s jazzy hip-hop style. He played in rock bands all through high school and has now been drumming for The Press for four years. Although the genres are different, his passion is about the same for each, he said.  

“It’s still music and it’s still the same language, but with a different accent and vocabulary,” Trikakis said. “It’s second nature at this point. I don’t even really think about it.”

Sharing a bill with Blues Traveler was an educational experience for The Honors, just as opening for acts like The Roots, George Clinton and Robert Randolph was eye-opening for The Press Project. 

“When you’re allowed to watch your heroes from backstage doing what they do, not just once but on several occasions, and you’re awake, aware, not drunk or stoned or flirting with groupies, well, you learn,” Trikakis said. “You take notes and bring what you’ve learned back to your own band.”

The Honors’ professionalism is evident both on the new EP and on stage, where the band’s energy and enjoyment manifest even more clearly. The band is working on a full-length album, slated for release in June 2009, and a promotional tour is planned for that summer. For more information, go to www.myspace.com/thehonorsmusic.