The Door

Four years ago (or so) I went to The Door in Dallas, Texas to see Sherwood play. At the time, I had no clue who Quietdrive, Discover America, or Waking Ashland were, but now they all have spots in most of my playlists. I'm not really here to talk about how great that concert was, from Quietdrive's version of "Time After Time," Discover America's "Green Eyes," that tambourine dude from Sherwood, to "All Hands on Deck" basically selling me Waking Ashland's CD. Nope, we're not here for that...

We're here to talk about Waking Ashland's latest CD, The Well. The last two albums, Telescopes and, before it, Composure, were a great success for the band. They managed to churn out great lyrics and soulful ballads, and wrapped it all in this nice, neat piano rock package. On The Well, we still hear bits of that sound, but none of the catchy melodies or emotion of the first two albums. The Well is about as contrived as it gets... Check these lyrics:

"Raindrops on the windshield they're catching my eyes
They were falling with such grace until they washed away
Leaving a dashing display
No single one looked the same."

I mean, really? I think they at least covered their weak sauce tunes by ending the song:

"The piano don't sing like it did…"

Piano being a metaphor for the band, I think. That's just a taste of what you would get on their new album. I've only listened twice now, but I'm not really falling in love with anything here. Hopefully I can at least find one of two tunes to latch on to. The only takeaway is that at least I can fall back on Composure...