It doesn’t take long to realise what kind of album “The Upsides” is going to be, it even opens with a cliché that’s far too overused in the genre, a softly sung intro accompanied by gentle picking that eventually swells into the blazing drums and guitar. Unfortunately “The Upsides” is ridden with these clichés. Gang shouts and “whoas” being the main re-occurring offenders, which I can sometimes overlook but bundled with the other problems make it just too much for me.

With all that said, “The Upsides” does have a couple of redeeming features. Buried beneath the layers of cheese lie some pretty amazing riffs, especially the opening to “This Party Sucks”, and you can’t fault the band’s abilities at all, every note is executed with sheer precision but on the flip side you always feel like it’s a little too clean cut keeping you distanced from it.

Music like this has always been a guilty pleasure of mine in small doses but unfortunately “The Upsides” doesn’t really give me a reason to throw those records away, there’s no doubt that The Wonder Years are going to get pretty big, but it’s just not my cup of tea. The Point I think I’m trying to make is that if you somehow own a New Found Glory album then you don’t need “The Upsides”, not that I do.

P.s. good call on the use of “tripping balls” in New Years With Carl Weathers.

This Party Sucks

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