Review Summary: Animosity is easily accessible, but wholly satisfying as well.
Sevendust, along with their third studio-album, are masterful. Here, on
Animosity, the band twist together some of their strongest songs and give birth to an emotive masterwork. With the hearts of flawed, yet strong, human beings, the band form some songs that would make the small heart of a Grinch grow three sizes larger. Every verse, in every song, is powerful and sincere.
Animosity is a masterpiece because it is hopeful, focused on the group and evokes sincere emotion.
Radio-friendly may be a word some may use in describing Sevendust, but it is the kind of radio-friendly music that deserves to be listened to. The music packs a punch and feels like it has been made for a reason; not a phony one. The music is inspired and inspiring, such as the engaging
Redefine with the lyrics:
"So I'm wrong / I'm not alone / Seems like you're scared / You're holding me back again". The band displays outstanding confidence in depicting events they, or others, must overcome to live in peace. These events are often not resolved through the lyrics of a song, but instead through the band and their rising performance. The build-up is the pay-off to overcoming these events and the build-up in their performance displays hope and release.
Angel's Son is solid in depicting the loss of one closest to the group, but the song builds to a close by giving everyone within the group a spotlight together. The drumming is breathtaking during the final
"I know you never said goodbye" lyric and leads into a light-shedding instrumentation beneath Lajon and his powerfully uplifting lead-vocal work.
This is not the return of Clint Lowery, like in his return for
Cold Day Memory, but this record is an example of why he belongs with Sevendust.
Xmas Day is a spectacular display for Lowery and is the best track on the album because it is a surprising departure from what they have delivered on the past four tracks. Opening with the beautiful sound of drums and crystal-clear guitar strums, the opening gives you the sense of entering another country; like the start of a foreign movie. Lowery takes the lead in this particular track and gives a victorious performance, evoking the raw emotion of a son and his fading mother. The electric pops played throughout the background of the final verse burn the image of snowfall into the foreground of the song, symbolizing the events of an unforgettable Christmas Day.
One thing the band has never shied away from is a sincere and emotional drive that a plethora of bands nowadays certainly do shy away from in the hope of tricking their audience into buying phony emotion for ticket price. That is unfortunate, and it shows how audiences of this generation are becoming more and more uninterested in music that expresses true thought and feeling.
"One single life / Needs not to die / For such a cheap price / For one last flight / God save the child", this is from
Dead Set and it is beautiful. One of the strongest songs on the release displays a life on the line, a man looking to save a sinner from a life of nothingness....
Dead Set is astonishing and is followed by the equally powerful
Shine which tells the story from the eyes of a human at crisis, like Peter Parker as Spider-Man, and within the crisis trying to find themselves.
"So hard / Hard for me to shine"....
With numerous albums within their arsenal, Sevendust crafts their third-studio album with relative ease and satisfaction. Pressing some dark and mature themes to the table, the band cement themselves amongst the finest of bands willing to openly reveal their hidden pains to the world. Sometimes the only cure for such a pain is to let it out, and the boys let it out in the only way they know how to: through music. A certain passion for the art must be present in presenting honesty and truth to an audience, Sevendust is one to follow.
Animosity is a masterpiece.
