Qwerty18

Awesome man! Thanks to you and your friends for the mission!

Interesting re-reading my old quote, I'm super happy my suspicions were wrong.

So, it seems like the sessions with Emily and Colin had been going on for quite a while already and solidified as a 5 units, before Brad warmed up to it and joined. By extension, it seems that Brad, for a while, was in that weird position of "Alright, the 3 guys are in, Rob is out. What do I do ?". Must have been a challenging situation to be in. And I am so glad he eventually joined!

That's a must listen. Great dive into how they experienced the last few years on a personal level, with a few details about the new album as well.

All is set up for "From Zero" being a huge success, especially if the 3rd single is another win.

The way I look at it, AO is similar in many ways to the new LP songs, and kind of foreshadowed the whole thing. Similar guitar tone, upbeat, energetic, super catchy, dark twist. Put Emily on AO and it's basically an LP.2 song.

That's a crazy line-up, damn.

As it stands, there is approx 26 min of unheard new music coming in November. Anything less than 25 would, to me, make it feel more like discovering an EP. I'm using this as motivation to keep the rest of the record unheard until november ^^'

I'd give a lot of money to be able to get that 9-track Xero demo CD with Carousel, Slip, Pointillism, etc. I may be in a minority, but I think the studio recordings of Xero (Rhinestone, Esaul, Pictureboard, Fiends) sound pretty dope for what they were. I would love to have more of that. A bit sad to know the ods are like 0.001% lol

The fact some of those songs were started many, many years ago is an exciting prospect. I mean, the only other time where the band collected material over multiple years before compiling it into an album, and without touring in between, was HT, and that still holds up as their best work (imo) and a landmark in rock music. So, there is that 😊

The chipmunks, the clapping sound around 1:50, and the wub wub dubsteppish synth are all really frustrating to me. How to blunder an otherwise beautiful song. Well, thinking about it, I'd be really surprised if that kind of production makes it to From Zero. Would be really curious to hear a Jon Green co-produced track more akin stuff on MTM/ATS.

To be honest, I'm slightly anxious about it being composed with Jon Green. It's not really justified, other than me not having been a fan of any of the tracks he has worked on so far (NCSM, Battle Symphony, Friendly Fire). Even though, to be fair, I think NCSM is a good tune that suffered only from the production choice, and Friendly Fire has grown on me significantly. Soooo... I hope they'll prove me wrong and release their best collab with Jon so far ^^

Thinking the same!

Wow, didn't expect another one this soon! Ithink I'll wait for the album before listening to any other track, but it'll be fun reading the reactions

Those guys are always super sweet. That was super cool to see the love and support towards LP moving forward.

This is awesome guys! Can't wait to hear this.

Time to give Out of Ashes a proper relisten, it's been a long time. Can't wait for the LPL exclusive !

When you listen to the more polished Xero versions of A Place For My Head Forgotten Pictureboard There is no question this is the same band, just with a different vocalist.

The TEM-HITC pair to start off the record promotion is super strong. Comparing with pairs from a few previous cycles, I think this could be my favorite. Loved the ATS one too though. LT and THP were 50/50. Wasn't hyped by the OML one. Not including anything pre-ATS as it gets a bit blurry to me 😅 The Catalyst - Wretches and Kings BID - LGM GATS - UI Heavy - Battle Symphony

Most of the starting run of songs, from SIB untill POA, was sang cleanly in the last show. Not a critic eh, just an observation.

Emily switched to clean singing in quite a lot of tracks already. The difference is really noticeable on songs like Crawling in the last show. Not sure if it's to give her voice some rest, or because the rest of the band recommended her to take it easy, or just because she thought it sounds better. I do think it sounds better on a fair amount of the tracks tbh, but I also liked the rasp being back in a few of the older songs like Crawling, so I dunno 😅

It certainly is very subjective and down to musical tastes ^^ For the record, I really dig the rap verses in HITC, they are actually my favorite part of the song.

HITC is a top-notch banger, but it uses a lot of repetition to do so. To me, it's like spicy food, it's easy to get too much of it quickly, and so I find this one more rewarding with less frequent listens. I think, as individual track, TEM is indeed more interesting and has more replay-value. However, in the context of the album, having some straightforward bangers in-between may help keep the listening experience more diverse and engaging. Silly example, but if every song was structured like TEM within the album (minimalistic chorus 1, punchy chorus 2), it'd get old quickly. Same if every song was structured like HITC. The magic happens when you make the formulas diverse within the record, even if by a little bit. The fact that, in the tracklist, the song prior to HITC is 1 minute longer makes me think HITC straighforward approach may work especially well when listened to in context. Personally, i'd have a preference if the record kept the rap-rock moments sparse. Maybe something like 2-3 tracks. Only one would feel out of place, but more than 4 would make it a rap-rock focused album, which is something i'd probably be less into at this point. Still, as a rap-rock track, HITCS is super well-done, and arguably better than quite a bunch of their older rap-rock material.

What a way to conclude this September run of shows. That crowd was proper epic, so many wonderful moments during that concert.

I've read a few times that those new songs should have come in 2017 but I have a different opinion. As bangers as those tracks are, they hit much more when you've got OML in between. It brings more variety to their discography. TEM and HITC in 2017 would have been less surprising and more cliché. In 2024, they hit the sweet spot for a comeback.