Review Summary: A solid addition to a genre that's seen much worse.
"Emo". I hate that word. It's basically a death-note in modern music for many people, and the main reason I can't get my friends into American Football. "It's not emo like you think!", I cry. "Just listen to it!". But no, I'm just told to go put on some lipstick and eyeliner. The word "emo" is so mis-applied that it's now attached to sub-parts of three wildly different genres: indie, pop-punk, and hardcore. Unfortunately the only genre that it seems to have stuck onto to the general public is whiney pop-punk, so the trend of people vehemently defending bands like Brand New from the foul "emo" tag will forever continue.
If we're
really going to slap on generalities then yes, Autopilot Off is "emo". They are definitely emotive pop-punk (or whatever the new definition of emo is). It's a genre associated with bands like the dreaded Good Charlotte, the All-American Rejects, and My Chemical Romance. Progressively it's become a tag more based on fashion than music. However, Autopilot Off fall into the "emo" category in the traditional sense. They're not the greatest band in the genre, but they are definitely a solid addition to a genre that's seen much,
much worse.
Autopilot Off definitely know what they're doing. They don't skirt around different genres and sounds like most "emo" bands do. There are no schmaltzy acoustic ballads littered around
Make a Sound. Instead, they stick to what they do best - write catchy, hard-hitting punk - and base the record around it. "Clockwork" and "Blessed by a Nightmare", by far the strongest songs on the album, are the most concrete example of this. Easy to sing along to after even one listen, this single song puts about half the genre to shame. The lyrics, just like in the rest of the album, aren't fantastic, but the music itself is exciting, fast, catchy, and difficult not to enjoy. Instead of trying to seem poetic, generally Autopilot Off realize that the largest strength of their music is the music itself, and so the lines are more filled with "O-o-o"s than complex rhyming patterns. There are a couple exceptions, like the flimsy "Divine Intervention" which accents singer Chris Johnson's voice and skirts the line between punk and acoustic rock, and suffers majorly for it. Not to say his voice isn't fine, it is, but it's not very suited to the song type, and lyrics that are standard pop-punk fare don't fit very well in a singer-and-a-guitar situation.
Instrumentally, Autopilot Off stand head and shoulders over their peers. The drumming is nothing short of excellent, the guitar is pummeling and fast, and the riffs are catchy. Despite how samey a lot of it is, I never really found myself bored. An unfortunate aspect of the consistency of the songs' sound is that the weak tracks stick out more than they would have in a more varied effort. Excellent tracks like "The Cicada's Song" and "Chromatic Fades", as well as the previously mentioned "Clockworks" and "Blessed By a Nightmare" are brought down to earth by the clunkers that litter the album, such as "Divine Intervention" and "Blind Truth".
Autopilot Off definitely seem like their abilities lie only in writing one kind of song, and they are amazingly skilled at that one type; their fast, catchy, riff-based, psych-you-up punk songs may be some of the best the genre's ever seen. What that limited palette amounts to is a 3.5 out of 5 instead of the 4.5 or maybe even 5 that they'd deserve had they managed to make a varied yet consistent effort. What
Make A Sound is is more of a collection of songs to pick and choose from rather than a cohesive and consistent album.
Pros:
Song incredible stuff on here
Excellent instrumentation
Cons:
Lack of variation keeps this from being a classic.
Definitely Download:
Make A Sound
Clockworks
Blessed By A Nightmare
Chromatic Fades
The Cicada's Song
