First off, I give full credit to JesusFreakHideout.com for the idea of using a blog to recommend favorite albums weekly. It's an exercise they've been practicing for a while now - I am merely doing the same thing. I saw that, and thought it would be pretty cool to add it to my music blog, so... voila! But instead of giving you, the reader, a newly recommended album per week, I am going to do one every two weeks, preferably on Mondays. So, without further ado, I give you the first installment of my "I Recommend" blogs. Enjoy!
Recommended for 2/22/10 - Skillet - Skillet (1996)
Ah... every good band has to start somewhere, and this good band's debut is one of their best. Featuring raspy vocals from lead man John Cooper in their rawest form, set to a lush grunge soundtrack, this album is a highlight of these artists' career. While the production may not shine as well as it probably did in '96, the original, creative lyrics (something we haven't saw from this band in quite a while...) more than make up for it. So be sure to pick this one up, don't get Awake and Comatose, and stop there.
Song Highlights: "I Can", "Paint", "Saturn", "Boundaries
Have comments on this album? Questions? Feel free to comment!
Monday, February 22, 2010
Saturday, February 20, 2010
A review of "Tonight"
Okay, so if you ever checked out my old blog, you may be curious as to why I have a new one. Well, there is no real answer to it, besides the fact that I just wanted a new one. My old blog was created in a different time in my life. I was different. So, I decided to abandon that blog as a whole, and start fresh.
First things first - my URL. The "speaking slowly" idea comes from my favorite bible scripture, James 1:19, which states: "You must understand this, my beloved: let everyone be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to anger." This scripture means a lot to me. It relates to my life, and I'm sure it can relate to others' lives as well. It's a hard lesson to learn, but we all need to learn to bite our tongues every once in a while. While this has hardly anything to do with what this blog is meant to do - inform people of my opinions of music, I feel everyone should check this scripture out - whether you're a believer or not.
The name "the sound" was a name I admittedly came up with in a hurry. It simply refers to the fact that this blog is all about music. That's it. Sorry there isn't some deep story behind it. (-;
Now, onto the most important part of this post - the music! Today I'm reviewing toby Mac's newest release Tonight, which was released just under two weeks ago. While having a new toby Mac album is always nice, I've become more and more let down with each album he has released. While his first two solo efforts Momentum and Diverse City are two albums I hold near and dear, his third effort, 2007's Portable Sounds, was nothing like his first two albums, being nothing short of a major fail on his part. Sure, the album had it's share of highlights, namely "Boomin", "Ignition", and "Feelin' So Fly", but other than that, the album came up short. So, three years later, we have Tonight, Toby's newest album. Does it measure up, or does it crash and burn? Well... a little of both, actually.
As soon as you pop the disk in, you get the heavy pop sounds of the album's title track, which features Skillet's lead man, John Cooper on background vocals. While an album highlight, the tune overall is nothing that we haven't heard before, and the idea actually gets replayed throughout the duration of the album. It's rather sad, actually, seeing as both John and Toby could have come up with something a bit more unique - I know they could have.
The more melodic songs take the gold here, those being "Hold On", "Get Back Up", and "City On Our Knees", mainly. The auto-tune effects on Toby's voice are much more noticeable here, but they add to the quality and beauty of these three tracks. Of these three, "City On our Knees" is my favorite, and it's an excellent song, perhaps in my top 5 of toby Mac's entire solo career. It touches on the idea of unity among humans, and works perfectly here.
Some other favorites are the fun "LoudNclear", which is the inevitable "TruDog" track that appears on ever toby Mac album. "Funky Jesus Music" is rather unique, expanding on the bouncy sound that made "Diverse City" and "Feelin' So Fly" such highlights, yet taking on a life of it's own. "Captured" helps in picking up the pieces of what is the album's back half. It takes on a desperate feel a la' "Burn For You" from his 2004 Diverse City project, and works just as well as that song.
And we can't have album highlights without album lowlights! Perhaps the songs that are the worst here are two that are rather popular in public opinion, it seems - "Showstopper" and "Hey Devil". "Showstopper" is nothing more than a quick grab at the popularity of "Boomin", and is frighteningly similar to said song. "Hey Devil" is simply too cheesy for my tastes, treating the devil as a boyfriend, or something, and it just does not work. It sounds like something Carman would have wrote in the mid-'90's, and no, that is not a compliment.
Overall, I have to say I'm sadly disappointed in this album. Not all of it, just a good portion of it. While there are many highlights, they just stay overshadowed by the horrible songs. Perhaps I had too high of hopes for it. Nothing could possibly reach the heights that Momentum did in it's heyday. The main problem with this album is that fact that it feels like we've heard it all before - a problem that also plagued much of Portable Sounds. I'd recommend it to anyone, just approach with caution, or perhaps check out some previews first.
3/5
First things first - my URL. The "speaking slowly" idea comes from my favorite bible scripture, James 1:19, which states: "You must understand this, my beloved: let everyone be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to anger." This scripture means a lot to me. It relates to my life, and I'm sure it can relate to others' lives as well. It's a hard lesson to learn, but we all need to learn to bite our tongues every once in a while. While this has hardly anything to do with what this blog is meant to do - inform people of my opinions of music, I feel everyone should check this scripture out - whether you're a believer or not.
The name "the sound" was a name I admittedly came up with in a hurry. It simply refers to the fact that this blog is all about music. That's it. Sorry there isn't some deep story behind it. (-;
Now, onto the most important part of this post - the music! Today I'm reviewing toby Mac's newest release Tonight, which was released just under two weeks ago. While having a new toby Mac album is always nice, I've become more and more let down with each album he has released. While his first two solo efforts Momentum and Diverse City are two albums I hold near and dear, his third effort, 2007's Portable Sounds, was nothing like his first two albums, being nothing short of a major fail on his part. Sure, the album had it's share of highlights, namely "Boomin", "Ignition", and "Feelin' So Fly", but other than that, the album came up short. So, three years later, we have Tonight, Toby's newest album. Does it measure up, or does it crash and burn? Well... a little of both, actually.
As soon as you pop the disk in, you get the heavy pop sounds of the album's title track, which features Skillet's lead man, John Cooper on background vocals. While an album highlight, the tune overall is nothing that we haven't heard before, and the idea actually gets replayed throughout the duration of the album. It's rather sad, actually, seeing as both John and Toby could have come up with something a bit more unique - I know they could have.
The more melodic songs take the gold here, those being "Hold On", "Get Back Up", and "City On Our Knees", mainly. The auto-tune effects on Toby's voice are much more noticeable here, but they add to the quality and beauty of these three tracks. Of these three, "City On our Knees" is my favorite, and it's an excellent song, perhaps in my top 5 of toby Mac's entire solo career. It touches on the idea of unity among humans, and works perfectly here.
Some other favorites are the fun "LoudNclear", which is the inevitable "TruDog" track that appears on ever toby Mac album. "Funky Jesus Music" is rather unique, expanding on the bouncy sound that made "Diverse City" and "Feelin' So Fly" such highlights, yet taking on a life of it's own. "Captured" helps in picking up the pieces of what is the album's back half. It takes on a desperate feel a la' "Burn For You" from his 2004 Diverse City project, and works just as well as that song.
And we can't have album highlights without album lowlights! Perhaps the songs that are the worst here are two that are rather popular in public opinion, it seems - "Showstopper" and "Hey Devil". "Showstopper" is nothing more than a quick grab at the popularity of "Boomin", and is frighteningly similar to said song. "Hey Devil" is simply too cheesy for my tastes, treating the devil as a boyfriend, or something, and it just does not work. It sounds like something Carman would have wrote in the mid-'90's, and no, that is not a compliment.
Overall, I have to say I'm sadly disappointed in this album. Not all of it, just a good portion of it. While there are many highlights, they just stay overshadowed by the horrible songs. Perhaps I had too high of hopes for it. Nothing could possibly reach the heights that Momentum did in it's heyday. The main problem with this album is that fact that it feels like we've heard it all before - a problem that also plagued much of Portable Sounds. I'd recommend it to anyone, just approach with caution, or perhaps check out some previews first.
3/5
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