Review Summary: RIP Casey.
When dealing with loss everyone reacts differently. Some of us do our best to continue living the life we had. Some of us look for complete change or something different. I know for me, I deal with loss by diving headfirst into music. When my dog passed away a couple years ago, Counterparts ‘A Eulogy For Those Still Here’ dropped and helped me.... I can only imagine how hard it must be to go into a studio after losing such a vital part of the band and such an important friend. Faced with such a tragedy what were Hawthorne to do?
Unfortunately for Hawthorne, what they did, did not work. Musically, the album is
everything that people say Hawthorne are. Its boring, generic and missing any bit of variance or flavor. Harsh vocals are no where to be seen, but this doesn’t make the album boring. The lack of strong melodies and memorable riffing does.
Say what you will, JT
can write a damn good melody. Here he does not. ‘Sugar In The Engine’ sounds like the worst possibly track off ‘The Black Parade’. ‘321’ is their only real attempt at a sound they had on the first two albums, and it simply misses. Micah does have some guitar solos spattered throughout. They are nicely played, his always been a better guitarist then he lets on so it was nice to see him shine a bit more. ‘Rescue Me’ and ‘Desperation’ being the only tracks here that hold any weight now and the only tracks I would come back to.
The most disappointing aspect of the album is that JT’s lyrics are good. It’s obvious he has dealt with Casey’s passing with this album, it’s just a shame his voice sounds so empty on most tracks and is surrounded by a band who seem to be lost as to what to do without their
wildcard Casey. ‘Four Becomes One’ hits still and probably always will. It’s cheesy, overly dramatic, slow moving,
expected but it’s Casey’s song.
Hawthorne didn’t do themselves any favors with this release. It’s a poor mans Jimmy Eat World and despite the
heavy emotion at the core of the record, it just doesn’t work. Hawthorne learnt from ‘Fragile Future’ and have grown immensely since. Maybe they needed this album to move on from Casey, if moving on from a loved one can ever be achieved.
