New Surrender

Emo: a genre with many similarities to marmite. A lot of people hate it with a passion, notably people who read the NME and treat it as holy scripture. Some love it, often mistakenly stereotyped by the media as over-dramatic teenagers with sweeping fringes, a sullen expression and dressed in black. Well let’s dispose of that myth straight away: you don’t have to be 13 to like emo. Some emo music deserves musical credibility. Whilst the majority of bands under this label are truly awful, the genre has given birth to some promising musical exploits. Fall Out Boy’s first release was a respectable record, full of anthemic choruses and it possessed a unique sound. In addition, the likes of Bayside, Punchline and even Panic ! At The Disco all flaunt records with reputable musicianship. The problem of the genre comes with the astonishing mass of bands pursuing an identical sound.

Anberin have had notable success in the USA, with New Surrender peaking at number 13 in the Billboard 200. I did have a glimmer of hope that such success must surely mean the band were a little bit special, but as the election (and re-election) of George W. Bush shows us, you can’t always trust the American people to have good taste.

Much of the album is either pretty poor or dire. ‘Retrace’ is the sound of band trying to merge two very different sounds, confused as to whether they are a full blooded emo outfit in the vein of Saosin, or more similar to pop-rock megastars Maroon 5. Irrelevent of this, or what they are trying to do: it sounds bad. ‘Younglife’ is by far the worst song on the album. It has the potential to be a nice acoustic track, but is ruined by an almost boy band approach the band and production team have decided to take.

It’s unfair to claim the album has no positives; in fact some tracks clearly show that Anberlin have an accomplished song-writing ability. Lead single ‘Feel Good Drag’ is the best track on the album by far. It has everything a first-class emo song needs with a dramatic chorus and appealing vocals. With the addition of the eerie keyboard sections in the verses, the band reach a level much higher than that on the rest of the album. Opener ‘The Resistance’ is akin in this respect (although it does blatantly steal the Bad Religion guitar riff from ‘American Jesus’).

‘Haight Street’ is a perfect example of potential the band have. Parts of this track, such as the fantastic chorus, point to an ability to craft a song that not only would have chart success, but also have real musical credibility. However, this potential is infuriatingly not acted on. The rest of the track is monotonous, samey and nothing more than mediocre.

Anberlin hypothetically could create a decent album with the talents show on ‘Feel Good Drag’ and ‘The Resistance’, but (in the context of this album) that is merely 2 of 13 tracks. In US every man and his dog that has a certain emo sound seems to be able to have moderate success in the Billboard top 100. In the UK, music fans seem to be more discerning with our emo / pop-punk-tastes, and the charts seem responsive only for the more talented outfits like Fall Out Boy. I can’t see Anberlin hitting the top 40 anytime soon.