Musical Maturity: The state, or quality of being musically mature; when one musically grows up, or matures. (
n.)
Musical Immaturity: The state, or quality of being musically immature; when one has yet to musically grow up, or mature. (
n.)
Yes, I know, both musical maturity, and musical immaturity are not in the dictionary, but they are real. As with normal maturity, musical maturity can take several years to fully develop in a person. Usually it can be done in stepping-stones, and sometimes its effects can only be recognized after a long time. Disturbed is a band that isn’t just a step on the road to musical maturity, but the band itself is taking that same road.
2001 saw the release of “The Sickness”, which became surprisingly popular, and went platinum overtime. However, at times the album seemed juvenile, and unrefined. This is the album that showed Disturbed’s musical immaturity. In 2005 Disturbed released their junior effort, “Ten Thousand Fists”. Now that showed musical maturity. But what happened in between just a few years for Disturbed to jump from musical immaturity to musical maturity? “Believe” happened.
Being in the middle of immaturity, and maturity is an ugly thing. You have some sense of where you’re going, but you’re not sure how you will get there. The simplest of things can be confusing, but joy can be had at the same time. You try to change things for the better, and sometime it will work, but at other times it won’t. This can happen to bands. They may know what they want, but they can’t figure out how to get there, and when they take a step, or two in one direction they may realize they’re going the wrong way. Disturbed did this exact thing with their second album, “Believe”.
Knowing where you want to go…but then realizing you’re facing the wrong way.
“Prayer” starts everything off perfectly. The guitar riffs that the nu-metal band has become known for now blend perfectly with the drums, and when David’s voice enters everything feels in synch. This continues for a while with
“Liberate”, and especially
“Believe”. The engaging bass lines, and systematic drumbeats on
“Believe” intertwine flawlessly.
“Liberate” encompasses everything that is good about “Believe” as an album. Rolling drumbeats, fast paced guitar, and bass riffs, as well as Draiman’s suave voice join together to create such an amazing song that it was an obvious choice as a single. “Believe” starts out as an exciting ride, but doesn’t take long to peak at
“Remember”, the albums melodic anthem. After
“Remember” ends on a gleeful note,
“Intoxication” comes in, and is a fun listen, but it’s starting to become clear that Disturbed’s writing process doesn’t do much to differentiate from itself.
“Rise” feels like a chopped up version of
“Liberate”. Its guitar lines somewhat help to shield the growing boredom, but eventually it all becomes too much to relieve the tediousness.
“Darkness” tries to relieve the dullness, as a relaxing ballad, but it’s too late to do much except begin to pick up the pieces.
“Believe” is an album that Disturbed desperately needed to write after “Down With The Sickness”, but that isn’t to say it’s a masterpiece, in fact it’s far from it. This was the bands stepping-stone from musical immaturity to musical maturity. There are more wonderful moments to be had than what “The Sickness” had to offer, but nasty zits are blotched all over. David’s singing helps to prevent boredom early on, but too quickly “Believe” shows that even though it’s an improvement over it’s predecessor, there is still a lot of room for improvement. Thankfully, their next album would prove to overtake both “The Sickness”, and “Believe” by miles.
Recommended Songs:
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Remember
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Liberate
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Prayer
3/5
