Disclaimer: my friends and I have come up with the belief that there are two types of people that listen to music: people that listen more for the overall sound, and people that listen for the lyrics or meaning of a song. This is by no means a hard and fast rule, and of course most people listen for both elements, but people have tendencies toward one or the other. I belong to the second group, people reading this review should understand that. Anybody that listens to music for the sound, and don’t care as much about the lyrics, should know that this album has a completely pleasant and tolerable sound. It has more of a country-western tint to it than I normally like my Americana to be, but the music is well played, well engineered, and it is not unpleasant to listen to as background noise.
The Lost Souls new album, Horseshoes, seems as though it is meant to follow in the tradition of the great Americana bands of the past. On the band’s MySpace page (available here http://www.myspace.com/TheLostSoulsVA) their list of influences include, but are not limited to, Johnny Cash, Elvis, John Mellencamp and Bruce Springsteen; despite being “influenced” by some of the greatest Americana musicians of yesteryear The Lost Souls seem like a forced, contrived band. The artists that influenced TLS were not “Americana” because they wanted to be (as seems the case with The Lost Souls), they just were Americana. After a promising start Horseshoes falls short and, by the end, it becomes an exercise in perseverance.
Click the Rawr! for the full review
The first track off Horseshoes, “Turning,” opens with the sound of a music box (this is also the way the album ends, track eleven is called “Music Box”) which, oddly enough from a band that is proud to be Americana (I found nothing nothing remotely Americana about this opening however I did find found juxtaposition to be charming), is the high point of the album. A pleasant strumming begins to overlap the sound of the music box, Gray Gurkin’s gravelly voice comes in (he also writes the songs), and it is all downhill from there.
Gurkin’s writing is this album’s biggest fault. For most of the songs the message is too obvious, too blatant, so much so that it becomes a little embarrassing to listen to. It feels, more than once, like it is talking down to its listeners as in the album’s title track where Gurkin sings “Horseshoes come close/Even hearta
ches get broke/With hope, we’ll find peace.” The songs, which are all as superficial as “Horseshoes,” are about similarly obvious topics: there is a song about the ever-changing nature of life (“Turning”), the fragility of love (“Matchbook” and “Wildflower”), the strength of the human spirit (“NJ Turnpike” and “Scarred Smart”) and so on. All the songs are extremely cliché, almost to the point of being insulting; while listening to the album the thought occurred that there was no reason to be listen to Gurkin’s lessons, because they are apparent.
Now, if I may digress briefly, some of what I am saying about Horseshoes might be because of just how angry the penultimate track made me (the final track, “Music Box,” as previously stated, is the best thing about the album, however it is only 41 seconds long, so was not powerful enough to erase track ten from my mind). The tenth track on Horseshoes is called “The Underdogs” and it is one of the worst written songs maybe ever. When Gurkin sang “Stand up for the underdogs/They got more gumption than your average Joe” I didn’t know whether I was supposed to laugh or if he was being serious (he’s serious) and with a running length of 4:05, the third longest on the album, that is a pretty long time to be annoyed. Much of the album is innocuous, it isn’t good, just innocuous, however this track is appalling.
Overall Horseshoes can be skipped. People that are really into Americana might find something charming in it but mostly it is a forgettable album of mostly mediocre songs.
The Lost Souls' Horseshoes is available starting today.
Click the Rawr! for the full review
The first track off Horseshoes, “Turning,” opens with the sound of a music box (this is also the way the album ends, track eleven is called “Music Box”) which, oddly enough from a band that is proud to be Americana (I found nothing nothing remotely Americana about this opening however I did find found juxtaposition to be charming), is the high point of the album. A pleasant strumming begins to overlap the sound of the music box, Gray Gurkin’s gravelly voice comes in (he also writes the songs), and it is all downhill from there.
Gurkin’s writing is this album’s biggest fault. For most of the songs the message is too obvious, too blatant, so much so that it becomes a little embarrassing to listen to. It feels, more than once, like it is talking down to its listeners as in the album’s title track where Gurkin sings “Horseshoes come close/Even hearta
ches get broke/With hope, we’ll find peace.” The songs, which are all as superficial as “Horseshoes,” are about similarly obvious topics: there is a song about the ever-changing nature of life (“Turning”), the fragility of love (“Matchbook” and “Wildflower”), the strength of the human spirit (“NJ Turnpike” and “Scarred Smart”) and so on. All the songs are extremely cliché, almost to the point of being insulting; while listening to the album the thought occurred that there was no reason to be listen to Gurkin’s lessons, because they are apparent.Now, if I may digress briefly, some of what I am saying about Horseshoes might be because of just how angry the penultimate track made me (the final track, “Music Box,” as previously stated, is the best thing about the album, however it is only 41 seconds long, so was not powerful enough to erase track ten from my mind). The tenth track on Horseshoes is called “The Underdogs” and it is one of the worst written songs maybe ever. When Gurkin sang “Stand up for the underdogs/They got more gumption than your average Joe” I didn’t know whether I was supposed to laugh or if he was being serious (he’s serious) and with a running length of 4:05, the third longest on the album, that is a pretty long time to be annoyed. Much of the album is innocuous, it isn’t good, just innocuous, however this track is appalling.
Overall Horseshoes can be skipped. People that are really into Americana might find something charming in it but mostly it is a forgettable album of mostly mediocre songs.
The Lost Souls' Horseshoes is available starting today.
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