Inaugural music review! Right here! OK, enough exclamation points.
I’ve mentioned before that I love music. My tastes are pretty wide ranging (rap, rock, pop, classical, country/bluegrass…) and I tend to go through phases. Earlier this year I was in my folk music/singer-songwriter acoustic phase. Right now I’m pretty much in a Linkin Park phase with some Pentatonix thrown in for variety. So, the past 72-ish hours have been spent listening to they albums on repeat in the car, on my iPod, on my computer… I’m not tired of them yet.
I’ll start off with Linkin Park and LIVING THINGS. I’ve been reading other reviews of this album, as well as those from their last release A Thousand Suns (which I somehow missed in my Linkin Park lapse phase during grad school) that I also recently purchased. They tend to run the gamut from hate to meh to love (honestly, from the Metacritic link, the reviews of all LP albums appear mixed…). Which I think is right… not everyone loves every type of music or every musical choice made by a band, even one they love. As a fan and listener, I can appreciate a critical review, as long as there is some thought behind it and it doesn’t devolve into “they suck and I’ll never listen to them again.” Honestly, it’s fine if you think that, and it is completely in your hands to do so, but is it really helpful to write something like that down? Does it serve a purpose? Is it really that hard to write “I prefer their earlier sound, so I don’t think I’ll purchase the new stuff”? You can be critical without being an a**. Why is it so wrong for a musician/band to experiment? It reminds me of the whole drama surrounding the release of Kelly Clarkson’s My December. “Oh, this is so different and won’t be successful because it didn’t follow exactly the same formula as the previous one.” If every album sounded the same, that would get dull very fast. As with everything, you grow, experiment, take risks. Sometimes the risks work, sometimes they don’t. But at least you move in some direction rather than stay anchored. Which are words that can apply to most of life, not just music.
As for me, I have been a Linkin Park fan since Hybrid Theory. And I continue to be a fan. I appreciate the evolution and experimentation that they have done on the last few albums. I love the angry screaming and harsher tone of the earlier stuff, but I think I might have evolved along with the band in my tastes. I was attracted to the more cohesive feel of Minutes to Midnight and A Thousand Suns. They are similar in concept to Green Day’s American Idiot and 21st Century Breakdown. An overall theme, rather than a collection of singles. A personal favorite from A Thousand Suns was When They Come for Me – I loved the tribal sounding drum that anchored the song. I guess I like sweep and scope because those qualities remind me of film, and movies are another favorite hobby of mine. Music that sounds ‘filmic’ (I don’t think that sounds like a real word…), that I can listen to whole like a score… a definite plus in my book.
Now, on to LIVING THINGS (finally… I sure do love a long, wind-up tangent). There isn’t necessarily the cohesive story with this one as with the previous two albums, but all the same, I am enjoying the music quite a bit. I think I’m a sucker for the Linkin Park version of melodic rock anthem, of which Powerless is a definite example. Other standouts for me are Roads Untraveled and Skin to Bone, which are almost Linkin Park versions of lullabies (a good thing, IMO). This former is almost like a ballad or an attempt at their version of a folk song. The latter just sticks in my mind. I think I finally decided it was because every time I hear it, I can picture some sort of Steampunk imagery or film in the background. Honestly, most of my favorite songs off of any album tend to not be the singles, but the random gems in between the radio-friendly tunes. Overall, I love the album, and it will be on repeat for a while.
The other music buy of the week was PTX Vol. 1. I loved ‘The Sing Off,’ and Pentatonix was my favorite from the beginning. It amazes me that so much sound can come from 5 people. And that 5 people can do some pretty inspiring things with their voices. Personally, I was an average flute player back in the day (middle and high school), and a middling to average singer (in church choir). So, I grew up in music, appreciating what it takes to do it, and do it well. I do not have the talent, but I love it when those that do have talent and drive and inspiration go out and do music well. Pentatonix is a group that does music well. Very well. They have a wicked bass and percussion (beatbox), and a trio of singers that fit right on top. From the new EP – which contains a sticks-in-your-mind version of Niki Minaj’s Starships and the awesome cover of Gotye’s Somebody that I Used to Know, as well as two original tracks – the cover of Imogen Heap’s Aha! stands out. When you hear it, it does not sound like 5 voices. It sounds like a chorus along the lines of Queen’s Bohemian Rhapsody. Jaw-dropping talent runs wild in that song. Their music makes me smile. Which is something that should happen more often.
