Label: Frontiers 2020
Review by: Urban "Wally" Wallstrom
Glass house? Throwing stones? I have spent many hours raving about the brilliance about Unruly Child. The tracks on their latest effort tend to veer between decent and stuck in second gear though. "Poison Ivy", the storming opener and it's head first down that thorny hill. Excellent AOR meets complex U2 rock and there are indeed a couple of fine moments of pure joy and songwriting quality on this record. "Underwater", marvelous little AOR number and easily up there with the best of them. "Freedom Is A Fight", extremely Poppy, but I enjoy the addictive 70s styled melody. The production quality is however a wee bit too weak and muddy, the programmed drums are meh, and Marcie Free's vocals are buried in the mix. Re-recordings of Unruly Child's best songs, "To Be Your Everything" and "Let's Talk About Love" (both from the debut) on their latest not-quite-as-great release? will merely add fuel to the fire. At this point I wish Frontiers would simply just do the new solo album by Free. Simply get the all-star songwriting team and quality producer on the case and make it happen. The world needs more quality music with the AOR legend/vocalist.
Allison/Gowdy decided to write a song about the AOR community, and fans, "Say What You Want", that don't "get" their latest releases and thus getting into futile and pointless arguments on the subject of internet opinions. If you can't take criticism, do not release your music to the public. Because once it's out there, it's no longer yours and it's Always up to the listener to decide what they think and (dis)like about your music. Surely Bruce Gowdy (g, k, v) and Guy Allison (k, p, v) are aware of this as they've been around the block since the seventies. Folks that can't take criticism simply means that their ego is not permitting them to look at the issue.
We simply can't control others and their opinions and especially not on the internet, but we can work on ourselves and try and act like professionals. When we accept criticism, apply it, and move forward, not only do we benefit, but others might just see and understand your point of view. Highly sensitive people react strongly to what others think and have their band write a song about AOR fans. Fans that do not act like Unruly Child want you to act. In other words. It doesn't matter how many albums or songs of Unruly Child that you enjoy/enjoyed in the past and future to come. You need to like ALL the songs or you're no longer a fan? Worst business move ever? Having a go at the AOR fanbase and biting the hand that feeds them, well, not really.
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