Rohan Kohli
11/21/05, 05:31 PM
My American Heart - The Meaning in Makeup
Release Date: September 13, 2005
Record Label: Warcon
Forget what you thought you knew about this band. With better songwriting, much improved vocals, and great production, My American Heart’s The Meaning in Makeup kicks their first release’s ass in all sorts of ways—it’s not even worth comparing the two, really. Well, maybe except for this: the band definitely still sounds like My American Heart, but that’s not a bad thing, it's just who they are. Trust me, I wasn’t really that much of a fan of their self-titled debut, but I’m totally enjoying their new CD. If you absolutely hated the band before, then you probably still will, but for those of you who were indifferent, give this band another chance.
Driven by riffs and aggressive rhythms, the album is centered around heavy, detuned guitars, giving off a very rock ‘n’ roll vibe. At the same time, the vocals definitely have that modern emo tinge, so the album has a pretty cool mix going on—imagine if the singer from Yesterday’s Rising or Ben from Armor for Sleep (the vocalist doesn’t really sound like either, but try to imagine a mix of the two or something) were to do vocals for a less riff-based Letter Kills or slightly slower, softer, less edgy Emanuel, and that’s perhaps sort of the sound you could expect. Speaking of the vocals, it has been rumored that My American Heart’s singer took lessons from Bono of U2’s coach—true or not, his performance on this album is miles above that of the last CD and is perhaps the biggest improvement for the band. It’s also nice that they’ve, for the most part, ditched the unnecessary screaming that showed up on their last CD. It pokes its ugly head up every once in a while on this CD, but very, very infrequently—next time I hope they just eliminate it altogether. Just personal preference, though.
With a short intro and 12 real tracks, the album clocks in at almost 44 minutes, 43 of which are actual music and not filler. It seems like it’s getting harder and harder to find CDs with this much music, so it’s definitely a nice thing to see. I suppose I’ll talk about a few of the tracks I liked the most (they are all pretty similar, to be honest, but these stuck out to me). “Don’t Sleep” is a song that I had heard the demo of a while back, and it kicked a lot of ass back then, but just sounds perfect now. It starts out with a simple snare/kick drumbeat for a couple measures but guitars make a subtle entrance, and then launch into an awesome, thunderous, alternating chord/single note riff. The song also has a pretty sick breakdown (no “chugga chugga screech chugga screech” here—also check out “Poison” for a simple, but awesome breakdown) and the chorus is pretty catchy. Since I’m a sucker for pop, “How Dirty Boys Get Clean” and “Runaway” are some of my favorites as they are two of the most melodic songs on the album. All the songs are pretty good though—some just don’t do it for me for whatever reason, but everyone’s got their own tastes. As for lyrics, they’re decent, but I don’t really care about lyrics in general too much. Some lines aren’t so hot, such as “Oh no, here we go again” in “Today is the Number Seventeen,” but for the most part, they aren't bad at all.
The production on this album is solid—the guitars have an interestingly slightly muddy, yet crisp distortion (you’ll know what I mean if you hear it, and I’m not complaining about it being “muddy” because it fits the band perfectly), the drums sound right up front, and the vocals sound pretty good. At times, the drums seem to be mixed too loudly, especially in the intro of “The Process,” most notably the snare, but it’s usually not too much of a problem. As a whole, it sounds nice and raw with the heavy guitars, but is finished off well with a layer of “gloss.”
Occasionally the album might seem to run together a bit, but none of the songs are bad, just a little too similar sounding at times (as is the case with many, many CDs). Regardless of what you thought of this band’s last effort, at least give The Meaning in Makeup a shot, even if you just check out some new songs on Purevolume or Myspace. They have improved in every part of their game, and I think this album will really surprise a lot of people. So, take just a few moments to check them out: if I’m wrong, I’m wrong—but if I’m right, then hey, you may just have a brand new CD to rock out to.
Release Date: September 13, 2005
Record Label: Warcon
Forget what you thought you knew about this band. With better songwriting, much improved vocals, and great production, My American Heart’s The Meaning in Makeup kicks their first release’s ass in all sorts of ways—it’s not even worth comparing the two, really. Well, maybe except for this: the band definitely still sounds like My American Heart, but that’s not a bad thing, it's just who they are. Trust me, I wasn’t really that much of a fan of their self-titled debut, but I’m totally enjoying their new CD. If you absolutely hated the band before, then you probably still will, but for those of you who were indifferent, give this band another chance.
Driven by riffs and aggressive rhythms, the album is centered around heavy, detuned guitars, giving off a very rock ‘n’ roll vibe. At the same time, the vocals definitely have that modern emo tinge, so the album has a pretty cool mix going on—imagine if the singer from Yesterday’s Rising or Ben from Armor for Sleep (the vocalist doesn’t really sound like either, but try to imagine a mix of the two or something) were to do vocals for a less riff-based Letter Kills or slightly slower, softer, less edgy Emanuel, and that’s perhaps sort of the sound you could expect. Speaking of the vocals, it has been rumored that My American Heart’s singer took lessons from Bono of U2’s coach—true or not, his performance on this album is miles above that of the last CD and is perhaps the biggest improvement for the band. It’s also nice that they’ve, for the most part, ditched the unnecessary screaming that showed up on their last CD. It pokes its ugly head up every once in a while on this CD, but very, very infrequently—next time I hope they just eliminate it altogether. Just personal preference, though.
With a short intro and 12 real tracks, the album clocks in at almost 44 minutes, 43 of which are actual music and not filler. It seems like it’s getting harder and harder to find CDs with this much music, so it’s definitely a nice thing to see. I suppose I’ll talk about a few of the tracks I liked the most (they are all pretty similar, to be honest, but these stuck out to me). “Don’t Sleep” is a song that I had heard the demo of a while back, and it kicked a lot of ass back then, but just sounds perfect now. It starts out with a simple snare/kick drumbeat for a couple measures but guitars make a subtle entrance, and then launch into an awesome, thunderous, alternating chord/single note riff. The song also has a pretty sick breakdown (no “chugga chugga screech chugga screech” here—also check out “Poison” for a simple, but awesome breakdown) and the chorus is pretty catchy. Since I’m a sucker for pop, “How Dirty Boys Get Clean” and “Runaway” are some of my favorites as they are two of the most melodic songs on the album. All the songs are pretty good though—some just don’t do it for me for whatever reason, but everyone’s got their own tastes. As for lyrics, they’re decent, but I don’t really care about lyrics in general too much. Some lines aren’t so hot, such as “Oh no, here we go again” in “Today is the Number Seventeen,” but for the most part, they aren't bad at all.
The production on this album is solid—the guitars have an interestingly slightly muddy, yet crisp distortion (you’ll know what I mean if you hear it, and I’m not complaining about it being “muddy” because it fits the band perfectly), the drums sound right up front, and the vocals sound pretty good. At times, the drums seem to be mixed too loudly, especially in the intro of “The Process,” most notably the snare, but it’s usually not too much of a problem. As a whole, it sounds nice and raw with the heavy guitars, but is finished off well with a layer of “gloss.”
Occasionally the album might seem to run together a bit, but none of the songs are bad, just a little too similar sounding at times (as is the case with many, many CDs). Regardless of what you thought of this band’s last effort, at least give The Meaning in Makeup a shot, even if you just check out some new songs on Purevolume or Myspace. They have improved in every part of their game, and I think this album will really surprise a lot of people. So, take just a few moments to check them out: if I’m wrong, I’m wrong—but if I’m right, then hey, you may just have a brand new CD to rock out to.