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Of all the current pop fair out today Collective Soul gets the least credit for some downright good, solid songwriting. From Stockbridge, Georgia, the band members met in high school. There are many stories how all got together with founder Ed Roland, yet another Berklee school drop out. Their first label album Hints Allegations and Things Left Unsaid was released in 1994. This brought about radio hits Untitled and December.” Another one of my favorite CS recordings is the 1995 self titled album, Collective Soul. Dosage was the band’s fourth outing and its most ambitious to date. Adding more programming, strings, and keyboards gave this work a more sophisticated sound than the usual alt-classic rock style of the group. Tremble For My Beloved has an almost Electric Light Orchestra feel to it, though I don’t think that it was intentional. This should be the perfect beginning to a catchy middle of the road rock and roll album, but it is too good for that, and keeps you listening. Heavy is a guitar driven rhythm piece that again, should drive you crazy but is something of a guilty pleasure with its straight ahead pop sound. Roland’s vocals manage to keep all these songs together. Simple melodies and choruses, catchy hooks, and the kind of pop stuff music sophisticates should hate, but it is all so well done that you can’t help but like it. Heavy never pretends to be something more than it is and stays short and to the point. No More, No Less has those catchy hooks again. This time the band saves itself with some pretty good lyrics and good solid guitar. Throughout all of Collective Soul’s works there is the underlying acknowledgement of the lackluster world of the day-to-day that we all live, finding the beauty in bits and pieces around us. Needs has this great Beatles sound to it. Here are some great vocals, strings, guitar, and lyrics all intermingled in a brilliant song. This band can’t be just a mediocre middle of the road rock band because it wouldn’t sound so good. Timing is essential to pull off a song like this. Dandy Life is a departure for Collective Soul and has a different kind of feel to it. Maybe because lead vocals are from Ross Childress, lead guitarist. Another very Apple Records sounding song, it could almost pass for Badfinger, but it has a much better beat. Run is one of CS’s best songs ever. Returning to that theme of modern meaninglessness, an empty theme that finds its redemption in the little things that keep life worth living. Compliment is just that, a perfect union of words and sound that resonates with the philosophical musings of modern life…another great song. It takes a certain skill to write and perform these kinds of songs. I’ll never be convinced that Jet, Someone's Knocking At The Door, and Live and Let Die are great works of a master songwriter, a great Of all the current pop fair out today Collective Soul gets the least credit for some downright good, solid songwriting. From Stockbridge, Georgia, the band members met in high school. There are many stories how all got together with founder Ed Roland, yet another Berklee school drop out. Their first label album Hints Allegations and Things Left Unsaid was released in 1994. This brought about radio hits Untitled and December.”Another one of my favorite CS recordings is the 1995 self titled album, Collective Soul. Dosage was the band’s fourth outing and its most ambitious to date. Adding more programming, strings, and keyboards gave this work a more sophisticated sound than the usual alt-classic rock style of the group. Tremble For My Beloved has an almost Electric Light Orchestra feel to it, though I don’t think that it was intentional. This should be the perfect beginning to a catchy middle of the road rock and roll album, but it is too good for that, and keeps you listening. Heavy is a guitar driven rhythm piece that again, should drive you crazy but is something of a guilty pleasure with its straight ahead pop sound. Roland’s vocals manage to keep all these songs together. Simple melodies and choruses, catchy hooks, and the kind of pop stuff music sophisticates should hate, but it is all so well done that you can’t help but like it. Heavy never pretends to be something more than it is and stays short and to the point. No More, No Less has those catchy hooks again. This time the band saves itself with some pretty good lyrics and good solid guitar. Throughout all of Collective Soul’s works there is the underlying acknowledgement of the lackluster world of the day-to-day that we all live, finding the beauty in bits and pieces around us. Needs has this great Beatles sound to it. Here are some great vocals, strings, guitar, and lyrics all intermingled in a brilliant song. This band can’t be just a mediocre middle of the road rock band because it wouldn’t sound so good. Timing is essential to pull off a song like this. Dandy Life is a departure for Collective Soul and has a different kind of feel to it. Maybe because lead vocals are from Ross Childress, lead guitarist. Another very Apple Records sounding song, it could almost pass for Badfinger, but it has a much better beat. Run is one of CS’s best songs ever. Returning to that theme of modern meaninglessness, an empty theme that finds its redemption in the little things that keep life worth living. Compliment is just that, a perfect union of words and sound that resonates with the philosophical musings of modern life…another great song. It takes a certain skill to write and perform these kinds of songs. I’ll never be convinced that Jet, Someone's Knocking At The Door, and Live and Let Die are great works of a master songwriter, a great collaborator... perhaps. One has to mix the pop sound with some depth of thought to make it work (for me anyway). Hey, maybe it is best done collectively. |
Regressive Music Review