The Needles the Space by Straylight Run

The Needles the Space, Straylight Run's second studio album, arrived in June 2007 as the first fruit of the Baldwin, New York band's move from Victory Records to a major, Universal Republic. John Nolan and Shaun Cooper had walked out of Taking Back Sunday to start this outfit in 2003, and here they sound eager to widen the frame: acoustic instruments, strings and marching drums crowd in around Nolan's piano and guitar and Cooper's bass, and the songs swell rather than shout.

They cut it at Red Wire Audio and Sapone Studios over August and September 2006, with Mike Sapone and Bryan Russell engineering. "Soon We'll Be Living in the Future" and "Still Alone" went out as singles, and the band toured hard behind it, from a co-headlining run with Sparta to the Warped Tour and a support slot for the Bravery. It reached 72 on the Billboard 200, and by the end of the year the label had dropped them.

Written with AI assistance from RockLists chart data, MusicBrainz and Wikipedia.