I really love the new Wallflowers CD, Breach. I've been playing it about three times a day for the last week. It's so pervasive in my life right now that the last three days I've woken up in the morning with three different songs from it in my head.
The Wallflowers hit it big with their second album, Bringing Down the Horse. They had several radio hits with that album: "One Headlight," "The Difference," and "6th Avenue Heartache." Their videos were cool. They sounded like a good rock band. I own that record and I have always enjoyed it. But Breach goes places that one never did.
This time the band is trying some new musical approaches, although mostly it's still that same guitar-driven classic rock sound. But the lyrics this time are miles away from Bringing Down the Horse. Lots of people are saying they're more personal, and they are. They're also more complex, and more nuanced. The result is that these thoughtful songs speak to me a lot more clearly than the ones on the last record did. I listen to a bunch of these songs over and over again just to hear the words.
The songs cover a lot of thematic ground, from alienation to parenthood. In a lot of them, the imagery is darker than on the last album, which I also like. Maybe it appeals to my darker side.
I have drawn blood from the neckline When vampires were in fashion You know I'd even learn to cut my throat If I thought I could fit in 'Cause I once heard that you gotta learn How to blend in to this mess Where nothing's hard, nothing's precious And nothing's smooth or flawless
Now, no more amused Just screaming to be delivered For the first time
"I've Been Delivered"
Jakob Dylan's vocal delivery is great on this CD. As well as his lyrics, I love his sense of how to sing a line. Some of my favorite songs on the CD: "I've Been Delivered," "Sleepwalker," "Hand Me Down," "Up from Under," "Some Flowers Bloom Dead," and "Baby Bird" (a hidden track).
I really love the new Wallflowers CD, Breach. I've been playing it about three times a day for the last week. It's so pervasive in my life right now that the last three days I've woken up in the morning with three different songs from it in my head.
