Review Summary: While it does contain some enjoyable offerings, Melodia just feels bored as a whole.
The Vines are a very frustrating band, and not many people would argue with that. After their 2004 sophomore effort,
Winning Days, was released, lead singer/guitarist/songwriter Craig Nicholls became a shell of his former musical self. Ever since 2006's
Vision Valley, The Vines became a very inoffensive and watered down version of themselves, only showing true signs of brilliance every once in a while.
Melodia is not an exception.
For one, the half-hour disc is very predicable, with a very basic pattern: Garage-punk song, then a melodic ballad, with a couple of poppy tracks thrown into the mix. The instrumentation isn't very memorable either, with the bass staying in it's comfort zone and following the guitars, not making much of a name for itself. The actual riffs themselves aren't quite interesting, mostly composed of simple power chords and nothing else. However, as mentioned earlier, The Vines do manage to hide tiny streaks of greatness within this record.
The longest track, "True As The Night", includes a very beautiful string section that comes in to play by the last half of the track, creating a very colorful and pretty experience. "Braindead" actually utilize the simple four power chord method very well, giving a very cold and sinister feel to the track. The final track, "She Is Gone", is surprisingly catchy and makes a very good ending to the record. The bass here strays away from the guitars for once, giving the song a very fresh tone to it. After ending with vocal harmonies and a few delayed guitar affects here and there, The Vines managed to create a solid ending to a rather flimsy effort.
While it does contain some enjoyable offerings,
Melodia just feels bored as a whole, which frustrates me greatly. The Vines have proven themselves to be a worthy band from past releases such as
Highly Evolved and
Winning Days, but here they just sound like they only made this record just so they can expand their discography more than anything else.
