Singles Roundup: Blank Era, Alana Springsteen, Anthrax, & Fallen Sanctuary

As we have reached the unofficial start of summer, let's see if we have an anthem for the season yet.

Blank Era - Sick Of Feeling

In the chorus of this song, Jaycee belts out "I'm sick of feeling... dead". It's a defiant statement about not letting the situation she finds herself in kill the light inside of her, but the ellipses give the statement a different context for me. The idea of being sick of feeling, in general, is something I can certainly identify with. As I have mentioned at times over the years, there was a long stretch of time when I thought my neurology was mis-wired in a way that left me without the normal array of feelings. I miss those times...

I encountered a list about introverts that said they "remember embarrassing moments forever". That is a narrow reading, but if we broaden the scope to the entirety of negative experiences, I think we're approaching the truth. It's easy to remember pain, and the echoes that live in our scars, while it's easy for the bright moments and smiles to dissolve when we get too tired to hold them in place. What Jaycee and the band are doing is reminding us to hold onto the parts of us that were good, that had hope, just with a bit less schmaltz than when Richard Marx told us to "hold onto the nights".

Jaycee's voice is able to hold the line between anger at how things are, and resolution that they won't be that way going forward. That balance has been the sinew of Blank Era, and it's why every song has been hitting hard.

Alana Springsteen - I Loved You Then

I often joke that love is a 'four-letter word', because it feels like a curse, and because I would sometimes prefer it to be censored. Alana's song is about the time when you are in love, but neither side is saying whether they realize it or not. Those are awkward moments where your heart is bursting out of your chest for someone, while at the same time being ripped apart at the seams by not knowing if it will be stabbed through by fate.

The track is a beautiful country-ish ballad where Alana's voice carries the confusion of those moments, and the longing to have figured out the answer sooner, because of what could have been. Through the choruses, it's one of my favorite songs of the year, but then it makes an interesting choice. Rather than have a bridge before coming back for one last soaring statement, the song instead shifts into a doubled coda, where the stirring emotion of the melody never returns. It's a dour ending to what could have been a great song.

What's interesting is that after running through it the first time, I can hear in my head how the questioning lyrics could have been put into the chorus melody, which would have brought everything full circle, and felt more like a resolution, even if nothing is being resolved. As it is, the song leaves me wanting, but not necessarily wanting more.

Anthrax - It's For The Kids

After waiting ten years for a new Anthrax album, I'm not sure what I should have been expecting. I was certainly not expecting a song with this title, which doesn't at all feel like something a veteran thrash band would be producing. There's a tonal disconnect between the verses and choruses, where it comes across as Anthrax being angry at the song's subject for being such an angry person creating a poisonous culture. That sort of reasoning is not at all out of character for the ways people actually think, but it makes following the thread of the lyric difficult.

The music itself doesn't do a lot to ameliorate that issue. Anthrax has never had the power of Metallica, or the riffiness of Megadeth, and this song finds itself moving along on start-stop riffs that put the emphasis back on the Joey Belladonna and the lyrics. The chorus melody is fine, but it's not immediately hooky, which is a problem when the song pushes us toward it. As a song, it's fine. As an opening statement after a ten year wait, it's definitely leaving me wanting more. If this is what they consider the best song on the album, it's concerning.

Fallen Sanctuary - Master Of The Sea

This is... interesting. Fallen Sanctuary is in the process of putting their second album together, which this time will be crowdfunded. While that is happening, they released this song that didn't make the cut for their first album. I'm a bit confused with the decision to release an old song that didn't make the cut right before you start promoting and pushing your new record.

Listening to the song, I can see why it didn't make the album. That record was a great blend of Serenity and Temperance, while each of their latest albums didn't hit me quite the same way. This song digs back further, with a chorus that is ripped from the power metal blueprint. Maybe I'm just tired of hearing that sort of thing, but it doesn't have the same staying power with me that the rest of their album did. This one reads as more generic, which might have worked in the context of an album, but doesn't have the same appeal when heard on its own. I can only hope this release isn't signaling a shift in where that second album is going to explore, because I don't think I can get excited about much more power metal that sounds just like power metal by rote.