I first heard a Face to Face song on a Vagrant Records compilation. It was the early 2000s, and the band—surprisingly noisy for Vagrant, better known as home to weepy emo bands Dashboard Confessional and The Get Up Kids—had already been kicking it for a decade. The band cooled off for a few years in the mid-2000s but managed to stick around to drop its eighth studio album this year: Three Chords and a Half Truth. The new record doesn’t deviate much from Face to Face’s older stuff, including the super-solid 2003 release, How to Ruin Everything: The tracks are grittier than pop-punk, glossier than punk rock, and rife with sing-along choruses. And, of course, most rely on just three thick, driving chords.

Face to Face performs with Teenage Bottlerocket, Blacklist Royals, and Joshua Black Wilkins at the Black Cat, 1811 14th St. NW. $20. (202) 667-4490. blackcatdc.com.