• Mike Berkowitz and Adam Rosenthal
• Evan Smith
• Eric Kessler
• Brendon Rush
• Matt Dotsey
• Jorden Edwards
• Dan Fabi
• Mike Rath
• Hishaam Habib
• Brandon Cheng

It is important to point out the layout of the album. Several of the beginning tracks offer pinched personal confessions and realizations by the lead singer, Kevin Barnes. On “Spiteful Intervention”, for example, Barnes loudly screeches and yelps “I spend my waking hours/ haunting my own life/ I made the one I love start crying tonight/ and it felt good!” Other catchier beginning songs, like “Dour Percentage”, wrap themselves up in the legacy left by Bowie. Whistles scream, base strings are plucked, and drums crash through most songs, making the tunes constantly fluctuate. On “Ye, Renew the Plaintive”, Barnes talks to his wife Nina: ”Oh Nina/I have become so hateful/How am I ever going to survive this winter?” The arrangements are absolutely bipolar.

The later tracks, take on a more darker and sinister tone. Barnes seems to be having a apocalyptic and violent breakdown, summoning up themes of revenge, confusion, and self loathing. Some of it could actually make a good score for a movie concerning psychedelic film noir surrealism (listen to “Exorcism Breeding Knife”), if that is even a real genre. The late tracks drag and drag… and drag, possibly denoting a sense of alienation from Barnes. However, the album ends with an upbeat epic, where Barnes yells “I love how we’re learning from each other/ You are such a positive!” Other music sources have compared Paralytic Stalks to Hissing Fauna, Are You the Destroyer, which received an abundance of intense critical acclaim. Both albums are dark, personal, and unpredictable.

Props to Of Montreal for making this physiologically deranged album. It sure shook me up. The confessions, the violent outbursts, and the sincere questioning make Paralytic Stalks a wild expedition through the manic personal troubles of Kevin Barnes.

Album Rating- 8.5

Black Broadway

The  Freshmen Student Government officers, Sam Amon (President), Jordyn Kopelson, Sam Snyder and Eric Grayson (Vice Presidents) as well as the representatives worked tirelessly making decorations as well as organizing the food for the dance.

“The kids had a good plan, they had a lot of ideas and they executed most of them,” said Mrs. Melograna, one of the freshman class advisors.

The dance had various food options with cotton candy machines, ice-cream with various candy toppings and a few bowls of candy for everyone to eat.

The freshmen sold a total of 390 tickets to the dance and Jack Friedberg served as the DJ for the fun filled night.

“My favorite part of the dance is probably the DJ and the dancing,” said Amon.

Everyone else seemed to feel same as freshmen danced the night away through Candyland.

“Everyone worked really hard to plan the dance and I think it has really paid off,” Kopelson said.

Clearly the Class of 2015 is off to a positive start at East with a very successful Freshman Dance.