1. They're no doubt amazing guys - love their mums, never forget a birthday etc etc.
2. No doubt great live.
3. This is the first 'user generated' album I've listened to and it is not a great listen. Just too much going on all the time. Too long. The sound of everyone huffing and puffing, but not offering a single memorable tune. Sorry Canada.
Catchy melody. Verses that deliver the message. Choruses that deliver a huge melody, sung by massed backing vocals. Lyrics frequently sweary undermining the uplifting chorus mood. Stunning over an individual track, slightly wearying over a whole album. 3.5 starts but rounding down for a lack of variety.
Utterly cynical corporate emo - every single instrument over-produced, every chorus huge, even the enunciation of the vocalist is profoundly irritating. Exactly what a 10-year old would play loud to annoy his parents, who should be instantly moving said 10-year old onto, well though I'm not an emo expert, I can't believe that bands i've never heard like My Chemical Romance, even Linkin Park for gods sake, wouldn't be better than this. In a throwback to Fred Durst times there's even a rap section.
Lyrics really interesting, music rather dull singer-songerwriter with very conventional full band arrangements. I don't feel I was forced to witness this, but was influenced certainly.
Easy to listen to, not easy listening. Always melodic, and some variety in arrangements lift this above average singer-songwriter. But I like mine with a bit of grit in the oyster, and this is all a bit too safe. Some lovely guitar playing, and I got through the entire review without mentioning God once.
Do they have anything to offer other than furious riffing, blast beats and a vocalist shredding his larynx? There's a hint of guitar soloing more out of classic rock but that's about it. Feel that all sorts of post-poodle rock subgenres are way overrepresented in these lists.
There's a lot of variety here - two instrumental themes, the delicate acoustics of Stretchmarker, alongside the rock riffing. So points for not cleaving to a single music template and hammering it to death (like Death, literally the last album before this). But a double album does mean its hard to stay focused, and as I often say about a double 'pick your 12 best songs please' It would a 3 for individual songs, a 2 for length and lack of decisiveness. Is it better than Death, yes it is, so 3 stars it is. A 2.5 really.
Can there have been a worse time to be a vaguely jangly pop band than 1989, when the UK was about to explode with either rave or Madchester or both. Never mind, they sold squillions of records. No-one could escape their singles in the nineties, no matter how hard you raved. Grudgingly they could always write a strong melody and this is perhaps ore interestingly arranged than I might have thought. Song for Whoever's chorus still irritates, so it's a solid but unexciting 3 from me. When is someone going to nominate the first Flowered Up album then?
Not for everyone, hence the 2.94 rating, I do feel that if you've not experienced the on-the-surface calm but surprisingly unsettling under the hood world of seventies UK childrens TV BOC can be difficult to access. Combine the music from this with slowed-down hip-hop beats and slightly detune the whole thing. Also of course flavours of The Wicker Man and other cultish horror movies. NowBOC have become their own cult.
Albums from the user list I already own : 1/12
Albums I have five-starred: 1/12
