Albums You've Listened To Today, V.9

[treeduck]

[Entre_Perpetuo]

The Warning - Keep Me Fed

 

The funny thing is that this is both their heaviest sounding and poppiest written record. Extremely high commercial appeal for people who like heavy guitars and scream along hooks, because that’s basically 100% of this record.  It’s also their shortest so far I think, which plays right into that pop instinct. Plenty of songs, none of them a second longer than necessary.

 

Do I love that? No. But I respect it. And some of the cuts here have strong enough hooks throughout that I don’t blame them for trying a whole record like this. Lead single More is still my favorite song here. It really feels like their response to Supermassive Black Hole by Muse, and while it’s not as incessantly earwormy and beguiling as that song, it speaks the language fluently, and I just love the playfulness of the hook. The call and response between guitar and vocal. Dani’s having a blast I’m sure. Other highlights for me are Escapism for the composition, Qué Más Quieres for the energy, and Hell You Call A Dream for the hook. Least favorite stuff is mainly towards the start of the record. Sick and Apologize pull the same kind of shout a word hook trick twice in a row, and I think it makes both songs a little less interesting as a result.

 

Still on board with this band, betting these songs rip live (especially for casuals in a festival audience I imagine), but for personal listening I get much more out of both of their previous records.

[treeduck]

[Segue Myles]

45 minutes ago, Entre_Perpetuo said:

The Warning - Keep Me Fed

 

The funny thing is that this is both their heaviest sounding and poppiest written record. Extremely high commercial appeal for people who like heavy guitars and scream along hooks, because that’s basically 100% of this record.  It’s also their shortest so far I think, which plays right into that pop instinct. Plenty of songs, none of them a second longer than necessary.

 

Do I love that? No. But I respect it. And some of the cuts here have strong enough hooks throughout that I don’t blame them for trying a whole record like this. Lead single More is still my favorite song here. It really feels like their response to Supermassive Black Hole by Muse, and while it’s not as incessantly earwormy and beguiling as that song, it speaks the language fluently, and I just love the playfulness of the hook. The call and response between guitar and vocal. Dani’s having a blast I’m sure. Other highlights for me are Escapism for the composition, Qué Más Quieres for the energy, and Hell You Call A Dream for the hook. Least favorite stuff is mainly towards the start of the record. Sick and Apologize pull the same kind of shout a word hook trick twice in a row, and I think it makes both songs a little less interesting as a result.

 

Still on board with this band, betting these songs rip live (especially for casuals in a festival audience I imagine), but for personal listening I get much more out of both of their previous records.

I just don't get the hype for this band. At all. 

[Entre_Perpetuo]

The Warning - Error

 

Oh wow… I hate to say it but this is a solid league better than Keep Me Fed. I understand the new direction they taken, but these are just better songs, more space to breathe, better guitar tones, bass that sounds like a human being is playing it. Love this record. And the ballads are magic.

[Entre_Perpetuo]

9 minutes ago, Segue Myles said:

I just don't get the hype for this band. At all. 

Well the new album isn’t the one that would convince you in the first place. If you really want to give it your best shot, imo their second album has the best bet of making you understand the hype. Queen Of The Murder Scene. Much much less commercial production, a bit of an MCR type concept going on, more lush instrumentation and dynamics, and the most of their Mexican heritage showing.

[TheAccountant]

On 10/22/2024 at 11:19 PM, treeduck said:

Premonition is my favourite and Caught in the Game is good. The two after Vital Signs are solid as well.

Thanks - I will try to find the time to check them out

[TheAccountant]

3 hours ago, Entre_Perpetuo said:

Well the new album isn’t the one that would convince you in the first place. If you really want to give it your best shot, imo their second album has the best bet of making you understand the hype. Queen Of The Murder Scene. Much much less commercial production, a bit of an MCR type concept going on, more lush instrumentation and dynamics, and the most of their Mexican heritage showing.

Could not have put it better myself.

[TheAccountant]

3 hours ago, Entre_Perpetuo said:

The Warning - Error

 

Oh wow… I hate to say it but this is a solid league better than Keep Me Fed. I understand the new direction they taken, but these are just better songs, more space to breathe, better guitar tones, bass that sounds like a human being is playing it. Love this record. And the ballads are magic.

100% agree.  Actually I would rank Keep Me Fed as their weakest album by far.  Its best songs don't even stand up against the run of the mill work from any of their first 3 albums - not that there is any run of the mill work on those albums.  When I listen to them I never skip a song on those first 3 albums.  But you get the idea of what I am trying to say (I hope).

[TheAccountant]

4 hours ago, Segue Myles said:

I just don't get the hype for this band. At all. 

Thats more than 100% fair.  Since I have (very) questionable taste and am actually one of the folks around here who really likes this band I will try to explain how they click with me.  

 

To understand why I like them you have to understand that I really got into Rock music in 1983 when I started listening to Def Leopard's Pyromania.  From that point through say 1988 I went wild with rock music.  The radio stations I listened to played stuff from the 1960's, 1970's and the 1980's.  Obviously I really liked hard rock, classic rock, AOR & metal.  As for new music it seemed that every week something new and interesting came out.  Then about 1989 things stated to change.  

 

First of all, music started coming out on CD's and few and few albums were being sold.  Why?  In 1984 I had acquired a perfectly good record player.  Why should I be forced to purchase a new CD player when (to me - and I stand by this) there was no significant difference in sound?  This was all about somebody making money at my expense - and I did not appreciate it.  I did not purchase a CD player until the early 2000's and I made my record player last until the motor died during the pandemic.  Most of my collection is still vinyl.  More importantly however, music started to change.

 

The late 1980's and early 1990's started to see the rise of thrash metal and eventually black and death metal - not my cup of tea.  In addition, you started to see the rise of country, rap and grunge - none of which are my cup of tea.  Plus the radio stations started to be all bought up by large corporations.  The result being that their playlists increasingly became standardized.  Once upon a time if you went from city to city the rock stations could differ.  That became less and less the case.  Plus the stations were still playing music from the 1960's - 1980's but it was the same music over and over with less and less new music.  Or if it was new music it was not my cup of tea.  More importantly however the bands I loved began to run out of creative juice.  Yes, Rush was still going and putting out some good music (although it took me a while to appreciate how good it was) but what about all the other groups / artists I liked?  Def Leopard had Pyromania but then Hysteria does not do much for me.  Adrenalize is ok but basically I lost interest after that.  Priest?  I don't care for thrash and they went in that direction with Painkiller so they lost me a bit and then you get the 90's - nuff said.  Maiden?  After 7th Son of a 7th Son you had a couple good albums and Bruce's first solo album but then they sort of lost me.  The Who?  What new music?  Boston / Heart / Journey / REO Speedwagon / Foreigner / Styx / Night Ranger / Kansas / John Cougar / Bob Seeger / Dokken / Twisted Sister / Skid Row / Cinderella / Ozzy / Dio / Triumph / Tesla / 38 Special / Marshal Tucker / The Outlaws / Jefferson Airplane / Jefferson Starship / Starship / KBC Band / Bryan Adams / Yes / Deep Purple - some of these groups broke up and for all of them, how many songs did they put out post 1990 that are classics?  

 

Even when you got new music on the radio that was 1990's & 2000's AOR (for lack of a better phrase) - for my ears it stank.  Yes, their was some good music out there.  I found Nightwish around 2010.  Groups like Blind Guardian and Dragonforce I was aware of but since I did not hear them on the radio I was inclined to stay away.  Other excellent groups (like Symphony X)  - forget herring them on the radio so I never found out about them.  

 

Then we get the pandemic.  I got back on TRF after having been off line for several years and while I was recovering from Covid I messed around in youtube and found The Warning.  It was a live show at Rock el Parque in Bogota Columbia.  Fire.  I was like "Why have I not heard of this band?"  Who are they?  The next thing from them I clicked on was 21st Century Blood.  The I heard the line "Empires are falling" my ears got a nice feeling.  The I heard the line "politicians trying but we know they are lying" and I was like "o shit!!  Man this is what I want to hear!  These lyrics are fire."  Then I listened to QOTMS and I was like "a concept album?  and they are so young?  This has serious balls."  Then I head Error and I was like - excellent, not as good as QOTMS but excellent.  The excellent live show & excellent lyrics got me into them.

 

But its more than that.  Its the music (at least on the first 3 albums).  To my ears it feels like its a link to that past I loved in the 1980's but not just covers or a rehash of 1980's rock where they are trying to just do updated 1980's rock.  It feels, to my ears, like they are taking the next logical musical step - the step that should have been taken in the late 1980's  / early 1990's but instead rock went off in directions that were not my cup of tea.  The music feels like rock has awaken from a 30 year long slumber or perhaps a departure in a strange direction that was not my cup of tea (yes mixed metaphores but I hope you get the idea).

 

Sorry to be long winded but I had to explain where I came from to try to explain why they click with me.  Their live show is a link to when rock was fun, somehow you feel they really enjoy playing live.  Their music is the logical step where rock should have progressed to (for my tastes) after the 1980's and the lyrics are excellent.  

 

Sorry I can't explain it any better - please understand I am not intending to be argumentative or preachy.  Just wanted to explain what I am hearing that makes me like their first 3 albums.  Their most recent album though does not do much for me.  I hope it is their CoS and not their Hysteria.

 

Hope it all makes sense.

 

 

 

 

Edited October 26 by TheAccountant

[Entre_Perpetuo]

24 minutes ago, TheAccountant said:

Thats more than 100% fair.  Since I have (very) questionable taste and am actually one of the folks around here who really likes this band I will try to explain how they click with me.  

 

To understand why I like them you have to understand that I really got into Rock music in 1983 when I started listening to Def Leopard's Pyromania.  From that point through say 1988 I went wild with rock music.  The radio stations I listened to played stuff from the 1960's, 1970's and the 1980's.  Obviously I really liked hard rock, classic rock, AOR & metal.  As for new music it seemed that every week something new and interesting came out.  Then about 1989 things stated to change.  

 

First of all, music started coming out on CD's and few and few albums were being sold.  Why?  In 1984 I had acquired a perfectly good record player.  Why should I be forced to purchase a new CD player when (to me - and I stand by this) there was no significant difference in sound?  This was all about somebody making money at my expense - and I did not appreciate it.  I did not purchase a CD player until the early 2000's and I made my record player last until the motor died during the pandemic.  Most of my collection is still vinyl.  More importantly however, music started to change.

 

The late 1980's and early 1990's started to see the rise of thrash metal and eventually black and death metal - not my cup of tea.  In addition, you started to see the rise of country, rap and grunge - none of which are my cup of tea.  Plus the radio stations started to be all bought up by large corporations.  The result being that their playlists increasingly became standardized.  Once upon a time if you went from city to city the rock stations could differ.  That became less and less the case.  Plus the stations were still playing music from the 1960's - 1980's but it was the same music over and over with less and less new music.  Or if it was new music it was not my cup of tea.  More importantly however the bands I loved began to run out of creative juice.  Yes, Rush was still going and putting out some good music (although it took me a while to appreciate how good it was) but what about all the other groups / artists I liked?  Def Leopard had Pyromania but then Hysteria does not do much for me.  Adrenalize is ok but basically I lost interest after that.  Priest?  I don't care for thrash and they went in that direction with Painkiller so they lost me a bit and then you get the 90's - nuff said.  Maiden?  After 7th Son of a 7th Son you had a couple good albums and Bruce's first solo album but then they sort of lost me.  The Who?  What new music?  Boston / Heart / Journey / REO Speedwagon / Foreigner / Styx / Night Ranger / Kansas / John Cougar / Bob Seeger / Dokken / Twisted Sister / Skid Row / Cinderella / Ozzy / Dio / Triumph / Tesla / 38 Special / Marshal Tucker / The Outlaws / Jefferson Airplane / Jefferson Starship / Starship / KBC Band / Bryan Adams / Yes / Deep Purple - some of these groups broke up and for all of them, how many songs did they put out post 1990 that are classics?  

 

Even when you got new music on the radio that was 1990's & 2000's AOR (for lack of a better phrase) - for my ears it stank.  Yes, their was some good music out there.  I found Nightwish around 2010.  Groups like Blind Guardian and Dragonforce I was aware of but since I did not hear them on the radio I was inclined to stay away.  Other excellent groups (like Symphony X)  - forget herring them on the radio so I never found out about them.  

 

Then we get the pandemic.  I got back on TRF after having been off line for several years and while I was recovering from Covid I messed around in youtube and found The Warning.  It was a live show at Rock el Parque in Bogota Columbia.  Fire.  I was like "Why have I not heard of this band?"  Who are they?  The next thing from them I clicked on was 21st Century Blood.  The I heard the line "Empires are falling" my ears got a nice feeling.  The I heard the line "politicians trying but we know they are lying" and I was like "o shit!!  Man this is what I want to hear!  These lyrics are fire."  Then I listened to QOTMS and I was like "a concept album?  and they are so young?  This has serious balls."  Then I head Error and I was like - excellent, not as good as QOTMS but excellent.  The excellent live show & excellent lyrics got me into them.

 

But its more than that.  Its the music (at least on the first 3 albums).  To my ears it feels like its a link to that past I loved in the 1980's but not just covers or a rehash of 1980's rock where they are trying to just do updated 1980's rock.  It feels, to my ears, like they are taking the next logical musical step - the step that should have been taken in the late 1980's  / early 1990's but instead rock went off in directions that were not my cup of tea.  The music feels like rock has awaken from a 30 year long slumber or perhaps a departure in a strange direction that was not my cup of tea (yes mixed metaphores but I hope you get the idea).

 

Sorry to be long winded but I had to explain where I came from to try to explain why they click with me.  Their live show is a link to when rock was fun, somehow you feel they really enjoy playing live.  Their music is the logical step where rock should have progressed to (for my tastes) after the 1980's and the lyrics are excellent.  

 

Sorry I can't explain it any better - please understand I am not intending to be argumentative or preachy.  Just wanted to explain what I am hearing that makes me like their first 3 albums.  Their most recent album though does not do much for me.  I hope it is their CoS and not their Hysteria.

 

Hope it all makes sense.

 

 

 

 

You like what you like and that’s fair enough. Though I do remember being in a similar mindset about a decade ago before my taste broadened.

 

As for this new Warning album. I’m not sure it’s their Hysteria (seeing the commercial streamlining but not actually seeing any hits), but I’m sorry to say this is definitely not their CoS. That was Rush digging in their heels about their own muses and not giving almost any thought to its accessibility. This is not that. Keep Me Fed is a very blatant attempt to streamline and commercialize their songs, and bands that start down this road rarely turn from it by the next album.  My hope is that whatever’s driving them to go in a more pop direction has more to do with their love of and curiosity for pop than with the possibility it might make them more accessible. If they really love and want to keep exploring this vein for the music’s sake, I think they’ll make something really special in the next couple records. If this is more about streamlining their sound to get a broader appeal, my guess is the initial hype will wear off before anything breaks them through to that mythical much larger audience.

[J2112YYZ]

1 hour ago, Entre_Perpetuo said:

You like what you like and that’s fair enough. Though I do remember being in a similar mindset about a decade ago before my taste broadened.

 

As for this new Warning album. I’m not sure it’s their Hysteria (seeing the commercial streamlining but not actually seeing any hits), but I’m sorry to say this is definitely not their CoS. That was Rush digging in their heels about their own muses and not giving almost any thought to its accessibility. This is not that. Keep Me Fed is a very blatant attempt to streamline and commercialize their songs, and bands that start down this road rarely turn from it by the next album.  My hope is that whatever’s driving them to go in a more pop direction has more to do with their love of and curiosity for pop than with the possibility it might make them more accessible. If they really love and want to keep exploring this vein for the music’s sake, I think they’ll make something really special in the next couple records. If this is more about streamlining their sound to get a broader appeal, my guess is the initial hype will wear off before anything breaks them through to that mythical much larger audience.

 

I think they intentionally went more accessible with this album in part because the record label didn't really do too much to promote Error. I think the band felt that they gave the label the best possible album that they could but the label just didn't seem that into promoting it too heavily. The band also said that in order to get financing from the label to record the album, the label wanted to hear three really good singles from them. More, Sick and Hell You Call A Dream were those three songs. I'm guessing since the label gave the go ahead to record the rest of the album after they recorded those songs that the band felt like since they liked those three songs, what about a whole album in a similar vein. If every song can potentially be a single than the label will be happy. Now, I'm not saying that they were forced to write anything that they didn't want to with KMF but it certainly seems like the label tried to nudge them in a certain direction. I do think that this is a very good collection of accessable rock songs and the band did genuinely write what they felt and are proud of their work on it. But there's probably some influence from the label which dictated the direction.

[Entre_Perpetuo]

41 minutes ago, J2112YYZ said:

 

I think they intentionally went more accessible with this album in part because the record label didn't really do too much to promote Error. I think the band felt that they gave the label the best possible album that they could but the label just didn't seem that into promoting it too heavily. The band also said that in order to get financing from the label to record the album, the label wanted to hear three really good singles from them. More, Sick and Hell You Call A Dream were those three songs. I'm guessing since the label gave the go ahead to record the rest of the album after they recorded those songs that the band felt like since they liked those three songs, what about a whole album in a similar vein. If every song can potentially be a single than the label will be happy. Now, I'm not saying that they were forced to write anything that they didn't want to with KMF but it certainly seems like the label tried to nudge them in a certain direction. I do think that this is a very good collection of accessable rock songs and the band did genuinely write what they felt and are proud of their work on it. But there's probably some influence from the label which dictated the direction.

That makes a lot of sense. I’m sure they do feel proud of their work, as they should, but I look forward to seeing them stretch a bit more next time.

[J2112YYZ]

23 minutes ago, Entre_Perpetuo said:

That makes a lot of sense. I’m sure they do feel proud of their work, as they should, but I look forward to seeing them stretch a bit more next time.

 

They are certainly doing things musically on the album that they haven't done before. I would definitely like to see them expand on that and I believe they will on future albums. They do talk about wanting to try new things and challenge themselves so I'm sure they will keep that going. Another reason the songs are very short on the album is that the record label put them in a tough spot with the recording of it. During the final months of last year the band was splitting time between touring and recording the album. So they had to get things done pretty quickly and needed to be immediately happy with what they did. The singles started coming out in February and the band finished up recording in December. So the label didn't really give them any time to sit with the songs and decide if they wanted to change something like they had with the songs on Error. The band got completely fried doing this schedule and said that they would never record an album like that again. So the next album they should have some more time to work on songs and not make them so short. There are definitely songs on KMF that I think could have benefited from small things like extending the intro or outro.

[Segue Myles]

Mallory Knox- Signals

Mallory Knox- Asymmetry

Mallory Knox- Wired

 

I love this band so much! I loved the UK rock scene a decade ago. These fill me with nostalgic good time vibes

[yyz305]

[yyz305]

[yyz305]

[yyz305]

[Segue Myles]

Mallory Knox- Asymmetry 

 

Was happy to note I played this today on it'd tenth anniversary. I love this band.

 

Mallory Knox- Wired

 

Terrific third album, I thought this would send them into the major leagues, but they just went and parted with their lead vocalist.

 

Glad they have reunited.

[custom55]

Dusted this one off.   Early high schools days

 

My favorite song off CORYELL

 

 

 

Edited October 27 by custom55

[bluefox4000]

Led Zeppelin-IV (10/10)

 

Now is this my fav zep album?  no.  in fact it's about 4th or 5th.  I burned out on it through radio before i ever owned it......BUT for me.....a perfect album is a perfect album and this IS one.

 

10 it is regardless of all i just said.

 

Mick

[Entre_Perpetuo]

56 minutes ago, bluefox4000 said:

Led Zeppelin-IV (10/10)

 

Now is this my fav zep album?  no.  in fact it's about 4th or 5th.  I burned out on it through radio before i ever owned it......BUT for me.....a perfect album is a perfect album and this IS one.

 

10 it is regardless of all i just said.

 

Mick

It is my fav Zep. I would say flawless start to finish, but I do have to admit four sticks is a little over par. But when par is like… 0, well that’s not really a big deal. Lol.

[Rick N. Backer]

1 hour ago, bluefox4000 said:

Led Zeppelin-IV (10/10)

 

Now is this my fav zep album?  no.  in fact it's about 4th or 5th.  I burned out on it through radio before i ever owned it......BUT for me.....a perfect album is a perfect album and this IS one.

 

10 it is regardless of all i just said.

 

Mick

It’s not my favorite either.  But denying they knocked it out of the park with that one is just being a contrarian.

[bluefox4000]

12 minutes ago, Rick N. Backer said:

It’s not my favorite either.  But denying they knocked it out of the park with that one is just being a contrarian.

 

Exactly.  This album.  all the elements just clicked and they just went crazy.

 

Mick