The Upcoming
  • Culture
    • Art
    • Cinema
      • Movie reviews
      • Film festivals
    • Food & Drinks
      • News & Features
      • Restaurant & bar reviews
      • Interviews & Recipes
    • Literature
    • Music
      • Live music
    • Theatre
    • Shows & On demand
  • Fashion & Lifestyle
    • Accessories
    • Beauty
    • News & Features
    • Shopping & Trends
    • Tips & How-tos
    • Fashion weeks
  • What’s On
    • Art exhibitions
    • Theatre shows
  • Tickets
  • Join us
    • Editorial unit
    • Our writers
    • Join the team
    • Join the mailing list
    • Support us
    • Contact us
  • Interviews
  • Competitions
  • Special events
    • Film festivals
      • Berlin
      • Tribeca
      • Sundance London
      • Cannes
      • Locarno
      • Venice
      • London
      • Toronto
    • Fashion weeks
      • London Fashion Week
      • New York Fashion Week
      • Milan Fashion Week
      • Paris Fashion Week
      • Haute Couture
      • London Fashion Week Men’s
  • Facebook

  • Twitter

  • Instagram

  • YouTube

  • RSS

CultureMusicAlbum reviews

The Fray – Scars & Stories

The Fray – Scars & Stories | Album review
17 February 2012
Connie Viney
Avatar
Connie Viney
17 February 2012

Since The Fray’s formation in 2002, their music has straight-tracked its way into public consciousness and mainstream success.  Despite being marketed as an alternative rock band, catchy numbers such as How To Save a Life and Over My Head, have rocketed to the top of America’s Billboard charts and have featured as soundtracks to a proliferation of American dramas including Grey’s Anatomy, One Tree Hill and The O.C.

It’s a shame for the band then, that this positive response has not been shared with the hundreds of music critics, who reviewed their first two albums with The Guardian’s Caroline Sullivan referring to How to Save a Life as “a porridgey, guitar-led conservatism”.  “Moribund”, “exceptionally strained” and “uninvolving” have also been words used to describe the musical endeavours of the Colorado-based foursome.

I find it strange when such an overwhelming accolade of negativity can make you actually root for a band.  So, when face to face with their third record, Scars and Stories, I can say with every inch of truth that I examined it with an open mind – something their worldwide success would appear to warrant.

On my first listen, the American tinged, ‘emo’ vocals of front man Isaac Slade hit home immediately.  The opening power ballad Heartbreak, chimed with an unmistakable similarity to their previous releases that all prior accusations of being a ‘poor man’s Coldplay’ rang ever more true.  Suffice to say, the lyrics ‘I wanna kiss your scars tonight’ added the final dash of insipidness that justified earlier criticism.

If you’ve been living under a stone and The Fray’s Grammy Award winning exertions have passed over your head, imagine a sound akin to Counting Crows meets My Chemical Romance. The Fighter – an angst-ridden ballad Slade apparently wrote about a Norman Rockwell painting – is undoubtedly catchy, but also painfully predictable.  This band appears to recognise a formula which has had them propelled to MTV screens for the last decade and seem resistant to budge.

The competencies of the acclaimed producer Brendan O’Brien, known for his collaborations with Bruce Springsteen, Pearl Jam and Rage Against The Machine, are certainly evident in Scars and Stories.  Munich hints at funk and electro, while Rainy Zurich is ethereal and atmospheric.  These undoubtedly mark a departure from the band’s previous albums imposing piano and anthemic chorus lines.

Assessing The Fray’s back catalogue, it’s clear that Slade’s songwriting aptitude can easily be called into question.  However, conviction is one thing we can’t deny the band.  We would have to have a heart of stone not to, on some level, commend the singer for writing about personal experience with the honesty and raw emotion rarely observed in contemporary pop music.

While I can only assume that chart domination will ensue for this album, I also predict an abundance of critics riling protestations at another display of mediocrity in today’s music industry.  Whether or not bad reviews even matter for the band is uncertain.  There is one thing we can be sure of: The Fray are hell-bent on staying put.

★★★★★

Connie Viney

Scars and Stories is released on 7th March 2012.

Watch the video for Heartbeat here:

Related Itemsreview

More in Album reviews

Jeremiah Fraites: Piano Piano

★★★★★
Catherine Sedgwick
Read More

Lonely the Brave – The Hope List

★★★★★
Emma-Jane Betts
Read More

Sleaford Mods – Spare Ribs

★★★★★
Mark Worgan
Read More

You Me at Six – Suckapunch

★★★★★
Mark Worgan
Read More

Pearl Charles – Magic Mirror

★★★★★
Mae Trumata
Read More

Passenger – Songs for the Drunk and Broken Hearted

★★★★★
Georgie Cowan-Turner
Read More

Taylor Swift – Evermore

★★★★★
Bev Lung
Read More

The best festive albums not to miss this Christmas

Georgie Cowan-Turner
Read More

Yungblud – Weird!

★★★★★
Regan Harle
Read More
Scroll for more
Tap
  • Popular

  • Latest

  • TOP PICKS

  • You Me at Six – Suckapunch
    ★★★★★
    Album review
  • An interview with Ifrah Ismael: Tales from the Front Line and other stories
    Theatre
  • The Queen’s Gambit: A chess story that’s not about the moves but the motives
    ★★★★★
    Cinema
  • Persian Lessons
    ★★★★★
    Cinema
  • Sleaford Mods – Spare Ribs
    ★★★★★
    Album review
  • Unlimited Festival at the Southbank Centre: Centre stage for diversity
    ★★★★★
    Theatre
  • RSC Next Generation: Young Bloods proves Shakespeare is timeless
    Theatre
  • The White Tiger
    ★★★★★
    Cinema
  • Female filmmakers lead nominees for the London Critics’ Circle Film Awards
    Cinema
  • Persian Lessons: Exclusive new clip
    Cinema
  • WandaVision: Marvel’s charming sitcom proves an astounding success
    ★★★★★
    Cinema
  • The Queen’s Gambit: A chess story that’s not about the moves but the motives
    ★★★★★
    Cinema
  • Undercover at Morpheus Show Online
    ★★★★★
    Theatre
  • Ten short literary collections to get you back into reading
    Literature
  • Mayor
    ★★★★★
    Cinema
The Upcoming
Pages
  • Contact us
  • Join mailing list
  • Join us
  • Our London food map
  • Our writers
  • Support us
  • What, when, why

Copyright © 2011-2020 FL Media

Contagious wave of energy at Hoxton Square with Niki & The Dove | Live review
Original recipe of the week: All the Single Ladies