May be 10 Years' finest effort in ten years, but it's more of a time capsule than a modern day renaissance.

You've just released what you believe will be the last album your band will ever make, the music coming out of your camp is off the mark and bog-standard. You're falling further and further down the rabbit hole of the charts, your Radio Rock is stuck in a bygone era. Injuries and personal issues have left you as the last of the writers, wondering where the next song will come from, if it will come at all.

At least that's what it looked like for 10 Years front-man Jesse Hasek as he approached the end of the cycle for 2015's already-forgotten 'From Birth To Burial' – the future, it is safe to say, wasn't bright. However, Hasek has since reconnected with founding members Matt Wantland and Brian Vodinh, who together reform the definitive 10 Years writing team that were at the wheel of the ship that rode the wave of the post-Grunge/Alt-Metal movement that took over the US radio waves in the mid-noughties (led by acts like Three Days Grace, Trapt, and Sevendust).

The result of their reconnection is the revitalisation of a band who were almost too far gone for a comeback and yet their eighth studio outing - '(How To Live) As Ghosts' – is their finest since their 2008 commercial breakthrough 'Division'. Written and recorded entirely by the trio, '... Ghosts' presents itself with a bravado the band have been missing in recent years, bringing back the competitive edge they once wielded to take on scene leaders like the aforementioned Three Days Grace.

Whilst single 'Novacaine' is a play straight out of Royal Blood's book and is the album's hook-laden highlight, '... Ghosts' is a revitalised beast yet to be truly reawakened. You can feel the fire in the trio, the guitar licks laying out the land for the chirpiest harmonies they've had in years, while the drumming invades your earlobes sensationally, and yet you're not as warmed up as you should be by a fire. It's as if this album is eight or so years late, lost in time when Radio Rock bands were common currency. The jangling sensitivity of melody-laden guitars in 'Ghosts' and the collective ferocity of the rhythm section's paint-by-Pop-Rock attack on 'Vampires' beg for something more; they're riddled with unfulfilled potential.

'(How To Live) As Ghosts' may be 10 Years' finest effort in ten years, but it's more of a time capsule than a modern day renaissance.

Jack Press