Call Upon The Author

It’s never nice putting a CD on to play hoping that it will bring something new and exciting to your life, only to have that sparkling anticipation crushed by the first line of monotonous and frankly uninteresting vocals.
Sometimes the hidden gem on an album is the slow song that has been smothered and tarnished by the fast paced, upbeat tracks that have sped off far into the distance and eventually onto a shelf where they will be labelled as the hopelessly over played. On this album that is not the case. There doesn’t seem to be any fast or slow paced songs, only agonisingly mild lyrical bores.
Every now and then there is a half hearted attempt to produce a somewhat exhilarating track as if to say: “thank you for putting up with us this far” but even they don’t put up much of a defence for the album. It’s on songs like these that the vocals and instruments gradually build up and build up and build up and… nothing, the song ends and the wait doesn’t seem worth it.
To be fair the whole album seems rather depressing which, in small doses, is fine, but that’s all the lead singer’s voice is suited for. Anything happier or faster and he might just lose that terribly depressing voice.
If you’re after something vaguely exciting to get your mood up consider this a friendly warning; this album is neither exciting nor uplifting and, unless you like repetitive albums, once you’ve heard the first couple ofnsongs there’s no point in continuing your journey down the track list.