Fading West Never Sounded So Heartless...

History

Welcome back to the first 2014 album review here on Rock D3C0D3D. Today we will be taking look an Alternative Rock band that have their roots soiled in Christian Rock. That band of course is the "hit or miss" Switchfoot and their newest venture Fading West.


As many of you may know this San Diego originating band broke into the mainstream with their first full-length album The Beautiful Letdown in 2003 which included the megalithic hits "Dare You To Move," "Meant to Live," and "This is Your Life." While resulting in huge success for the band it also became a bit of their Achilles heel since a majority of their best known work is from that album alone, which with a band that is on their ninth major outing, can be seen as a tad sad. But lest we fret for a band that has been touring and re-engineering their craft for the better part of a decade. So there is something to be said for a band that has withstood the test of fame and has not lost a single original member or call a hiatus. With all that being said is the newest venture by the band an amazing reinvigoration, or is it becoming obvious they are simply spinning their wheels? Let's dive in and find out

The Review

 Singles:

  As of 2013 the band has released two singles for the album. The obligatory second track track, call to arms anthem, "Who We Are" and the lead off track "Love Alone Is Worth The Fight." Out of these two songs the only one I find any resemblance of heart and drive is the latter. 
"Who We Are" may leave a few with the theme of being yourself and knowing that yourself will pull you through any experience you come into. but dear lord is there no soul in it.I don't know if it's the monotone vocal stylings of Jon Foreman or the incredible amount of electronics in this song, it just feels like any call to arms message has been muddied out.

"Love Alone Is Worth The Fight" is a tad bit better as the vocal dynamics are very well established showcasing the range of emotion we are used to by Mr. Foreman. Sadly it never reaches the depth of vocal emotionality of their most well known songs, but it's a step in the right direction for the lead-off song on the album.

  Originally thought they were on a mountain but the surfboard would make no sense

The Rest of the Album...

Now, I don't want to dislike the rest of this album as it incorporates a lot of what I love in music. The unwavering ability to mix electronics instruments with live instrumentation, crowd chants, and in the rare song, an inane sense of what the song means to the writer. In this album though I feel it is the worst example of how to do an album, it is no means a good album but it is also not bad enough to create any sense of rage inside someone (unless you are a huge Switchfoot fan then you may feel yourself in either camp). The album itself is truly just an "okay" album, the worst part of it is when it ends one just sits there thinking, "Well I was a tad bored but at least I didn't hate it." One may be able to boil down the boring-ness of the album to the fact that what it is trying to be is already on the market and done SO MUCH better by those artists. The singles sound like they are channeling the likes of OneRepublic and The Script which is not a bad thing since Switchfoot has always been in that same genre as the two, though they do come off as the poor mans attempt to emulate.

Of course with all albums there are always going to be the good songs with the bad songs so we'll just quickly run through them as this album sadly is not warranting the energy to be ripped apart or put on a pedestal.



"Say Like You Mean It:" Brings the energy missing in the first few entries full force allowing the band to have fun at a higher tempo. The electronics are well used here to chop up the sound and keep the entertainment value high enough for a 3 minute song. The vocal mixing is quite superb as it creates a garage rock sound before bellowing down to a Beatlesque acoustic instrumentation ending.

"The electronics are well used here to chop up the sound and keep the entertainment value high"

"The World You Want:" A great song showcasing the emotional depth missing from the majority of the album and switches the sound to a Third Eye Blind send up. While a majority of the song has Mr. Foreman stay in his solemn singing tone, it allows for his backing vocals (as well as groups of chanting) to fully illustrate and dance in the background gaining momentum until the final chorus where he goes full force in classic Switchfoot style.

A majority of the rest of the album stays within the same tempo and dynamic range presenting one with a song that starts out its build from heavily compressed electronic drum sets to the full band entrance around the second verse/chorus. I am not stating that this is a bad album by any means but sadly in 2014 Switchfoot is not adding anything to the musical formula that we have not seen already. Maybe back in 2007-2010 this would have been thought of as a much more inventive/stylized album, but in today's world of ever-evolving genre bases, Switchfoot's Fading West falls short of the mark in every regard, not reinventing the wheel. Which is not a bad thing as Switchfoot fans may love the direction of the sound I was just expecting a little bit more from a band on their ninth album outing.

DECODED: 5.0 out of 10

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All the music covered above is available on iTunes, Amazon, and Spotify for your listening pleasure.

BUY IT: Love Alone Is Worth The Fight, The World You Want, Saltwater Heart

 

HEAR IT:  When We Come Alive, Say It Like You Mean It, Slipping Away, Let It Out, Back To The Beginning Again

TRASH IT:  Who We Are, BA55, All Or Nothing At All

 

*As with all things, the opinions expressed our purely that of the author and should be taken as such. ** All images, music, and information used are for entertainment/review purposes. No copyright infringement intended.