Album Review: Wayward Sons - Even Up The Score

It hadn't dawned on me until now, but this year has been missing one of the bigger trends of recent times; vintage rock. I haven't come across much that falls into the category, let alone anything I think stands out, when that happens to be a sound that usually catches my ears. It had looked like the past was going to be the future, but the trend might be starting to die out. As our full-blown 80s obsession continues, those bands resurrecting the sounds from the decade previous once again sound dated and out of place with what's going on. How big a loss that is will depend on your perspective. Few of those bands made lasting impressions, but I would rather sort through a dozen of them than a dozen stuck in the 80s.

Wayward Sons take the old classic rock formula, and try to update it for the modern day. They aren't in the group that uses vintage equipment to make records that sound like time capsules, even if their inspiration is readily apparent. So we have more of a case of Rival Sons (not to be confusing) than that of Graveyard. What that enables the band to do is up the aggression and heaviness just a bit. There's hints of AC/DC in the guitar tone, and when the band locks into a faster tempo, the clarity helps amplify how hard they're hitting the strings.

That being said, a guitar tone isn't enough to carry an album, and Wayward Sons continue to fall a bit short when it comes to filling an album with great songs. As is the case with plenty of other bands that emulate classic rock, they also pull from the old blueprint that didn't put as much emphasis on writing compelling vocal lines for every song. "Faith In Fools" is a slinky little number that builds to a dramatic rise, but it's the exception here, not the rule.

Several of the other tracks, like "Big Day" and "Sign Of The Times", have neither stadium level riffs nor arena sized choruses. What we are supposed to pull from them and embrace isn't entirely clear. Those kinds of songs are hard to see as anything but filler, which does fit with the old-school nature of the record, but doesn't do much to impress in the modern day.

"Even Up The Score" is a classic album in the sense that it has three or four great songs that could have made singles, and the rest of the album exists just so there's a full-length product for the die-hards to buy. "Faith In Fools", "Fake", and "Tip Of My Tongue" are cool songs that have some bounce and hook to them, and could have been old time radio staples. The rest of the album is in limbo, where it's the connective tissue in between the bits you really want. As is the case with a cut of meat, some is necessary, but too much ruins everything. This record is closer to the latter case.

As was the case with their previous work, Wayward Sons are a band with talent that doesn't quite have the formula locked down just yet. They're capable of making a good record, but there's still work to be done on the consistency of their songwriting before they're going to get there.