It's interesting to see what some bands will do to be popular. Some may change their image to what is seen as cool at the time; and some bands will change their music to suit the 'flavour of the month'. With album number three, Pontypridd's Lostprophets seem to have done both of these. Each member now sports a fashionably acceptable haircut and even with a quick glance at the tracklisting to Liberation Transmission indicates that they may have changed their music to accomodate the majority's musical preferences. A lot of track titles here run like marathons (similar to Panic! At The Disco and Fall Out Boy). And listening to the album pretty much confirms it (although not alike to these bands.)
Contrary to the opening paragraph, opener
Everyday Combat could perhaps have fitted in perfectly on last album 'Start Something'. It is a definite mosh anthem and leaves you in a hopeful mood for what is to come. Next up is
Town Called Hypocrisy the second single off this album. The first thing you notice about this song is the opening riff, it sounds almost like something you would expect to hear from Franz Ferdinand. It soon gives way to a very poppy song with sickening 'la la la la's';however this song's saving grace is the uber-catchiness of it especially in the chorus. The riffs do prove to be a recurrent problem throughout the album. Whereas on previous' Prophets albums the riffs were very strong and heavy, here they are very weak sounding and are one of the main let downs on the album.
A common feature throughout the album that strengthens the songs is the drumming from new recruuit Ilan Rubin. He has a different style to drummer on the last two albums- Mike Chiplin, as he claims that he "listens to nothing from 1984 onwards". As stubborn as this is, he is certainly very talented. It is because of his drumming that the rest of the band can use influences such as the Police on this album. These influences are particularly evident on songs such as
Everyody's Screaming. This is an average quality song compared to the other songs on this album. What is not an average song on this album however, is
Can't Catch Tomorrow (Good Shoes Won't Save You This Time) . It starts off horribly with it's doo-doo-doo refrain and doesn't get much better as the song goes on, remaining very upbeat (which is not necessarily a bad thing) but done in this way: using cheesy lyrics about 'haircuts being hot' and 'good shoes not saving you this time' and a very basic pop backing track.
What will undoubtedly have left a lot of Lostprophets fans disillusioned is the big change in their music as instead of making an album with risks that not everyone will like, they have made a very mainstream album that will appeal to many without a doubt. For what it is though-which is a pop album (and don't you dare deny it) it is okay though but it is simply not what it should have been.
