Review Summary: Smooth hard rock that never sacrifices its heavy side
Lionize is comfortably living in their own skin on
Jetpack Soundtrack. They’ve found a formula that has brought life back to the idea of hard rock, a genre that most tend to cringe at the insinuation of nowadays. Its head in the clouds, feet on the ground approach gives it an almost flawless balance of accessibility and experimentation.
Make no mistake.
The instrumentation of this album is out right heavy. The guitar crackles, the bass is punchy, and the drums have a way of cutting through it all. All of it comes across as incredibly smooth though. The grooves that the instruments ride seal your mind in dimly lit smoke filled bars even when the sun is shining through your window. It’s all just so goddamn crisp. And while the weight of the backing band keeps your body on the ground, the keyboard takes your head into a spacey atmosphere. It doesn’t simply ride above it all though. It mingles with the other instruments fantastically, but it does so in a way that commands your attention and gives the overall experience a very different feel. However, all instruments have a time to shine and find their place organically. The vocals are gravelly and aggressive, but come across clear as a bell. They compliment the band in a way that mixes perfectly and ties together the sound.
The verses are paced without a moment of downtime. They transition to the virally infectious choruses with a suave vigor. On the other hand, there in lies one of the only major problems this album has. While the verses feel like the songs’ livelihood and the choruses on every single track are catchy as all hell, they are very easy to distinguish as their labels. After a few listens the songs start to feel very verse chorus verse-y. Lionize certainly knows when to jam out, but I found myself wishing slightly that on some of the tracks they’d go a little further down the rabbit hole. It hardly ruins the album, but it could have benefitted from a few more complexly structured songs.
All considered,
Jetpack Soundtrack delivers just the right dosage of smooth into a much needed truly heavy modern hard rock album. Its dichotomy of sound and songs that stick set it apart in a genre that could use some variety.
