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 Never Say Never and You Found Me are my two favorite songs. Oct 01, 2009
Never Say Never and You Found Me are my two favorite songs. I love them. I recommend this whole CD to anybody who needs courage. All the songs brighten my day and cheer me up. BEST ALBUM EVER!!
perfect condition Sep 27, 2009
great cd. I have the first one also. I was able to find out everything about this product before I ordered it. Job well done. Thanks!
 This is where the story begins... Sep 14, 2009
Putting out an album with 10 tracks is risky. Most artists today litter their albums with an upwards of 18 songs, knowing that a good portion of them are nothing more than `filler' but that will result in at least a decent 10 or so high quality songs for the buyer. When you put out an album of 10 tracks you have to be sure you are delivering 10 top notch songs, otherwise your delivering an `incomplete' disc. Sadly, The Fray didn't deliver in full here. In fact, exactly half of this album is brilliant (and by brilliant I truly mean BRILLIANT), but half is only 5 songs (barely enough for an EP) and thus the disc as a whole comes across rather mediocre.
I'm giving this a B- (thus the 4 stars) but let it be known I'm disappointed here.
It's not that the rest of the album is bad. In fact NONE of the songs are bad, but there are only a handful of exceptional tracks. The balance of the album is merely satisfactory. When you have five `filler' tracks on an average album it's not so bad, because you have at least 8-12 really good songs on the album.
I'm not going to beat a dead horse.
I'm going to take a second, before I get into the album, to just talk about the band in general. I was a fan of `Over My Head' but it wasn't enough to make me by the album. `How to Save a Life' was stunning to me when I first heard it, but I quickly grew tired of hearing it (this band is relentlessly used over and over again on TV and Radio that it is almost disgusting). Lead vocalist Isaac Slade is whiney, you cannot get around that. He is rather nasely and just comes across very vulnerable. It's a distinct and instantly recognizable voice, and one that I enjoy (on the right song) but it must be said that at times his voice makes it difficult to understand what he's singing (he doesn't enunciate properly) and so there are some songs that I probably would like more had he sung it differently (namely `Enough for Now', which is quite touching yet hard to listen to). So yes, his voice is an acquired taste and not everyone will like it, but that doesn't make it `bad' as so many have complained.
It just makes it different.
So, those BRILLIANT songs...
The two singles, for starters, are stunning. The first time I heard `You Found Me' I was instantly touched by the power in the words and the emotional connection I felt within Slade's struggle. Even better still is `Never Say Never', which totally caught me off guard. Like I mentioned, their first album resulted in two very good singles that didn't motivate me to actually buy their album. `Never Say Never' is such a masterpiece that I immediately purchased the album, same day that I heard the song on the radio. I think that it reflects my own personal situation at the moment, and so I feel this grave connection to it, and thus it brings me to tears. `Say When' is another brilliantly crafted track, one that really plays to Slade's strengths as a vocalist. He sounds impeccable here; best vocal track on the album for his style. `Ungodly Hour' is such a moving experience for me, completely earth-shattering and it just took me by surprise. It's one of those songs that matches emotional complexity with musicianship superbly; simple, delicate and unnerving.
Best song on the album, by a LANDSLIDE, is the closing track `Happiness', which just blew me away. The song is beautifully written, with such thought and poignancy, and the way it is delivered, with such grace and pain fueled sympathies, is just effortlessly engraved on the listener's soul.
It haunts me still.
That's 5, count `em. All 5 are stunning and deserving of as much praise as they can receive. Sadly, the remaining 5 seem to dampen their greatness.
`Syndicate', `Absolute', `Where the Story Ends', `Enough for Now' and `We Build then we Break' are NOT bad songs, but they are simply mediocre. `Enough for Now' is the best of the five and the closest to perfection (but for reasons I mentioned above it falls short for me). `We Build then we Break' sports an edge that I don't see on the rest of the album, and I wish they would have played with that a little more and perfected it because it just doesn't connect as deeply as it could have. The aggression in the end is flawless and could have infiltrated the rest of the album to unveil some nice results, but alas, it was not. `Where the Story Ends', `Syndicate' and `Absolute' are just a little to `been-there-done-that' for me; there is nothing special about any of them.
Oh well...5 stunning tracks is good enough sometimes.
2 of 4 found the following review helpful:
 Awful. Simply awful. Does the whining EVER stop? Sep 05, 2009
Maybe being past 30 has jaded me, but this group personifies the increasing trend for whining, dreary and tone deaf singers in today's music. The Fray's lead singer, and I use the term in the most generic sense, sounds like he has the stomach flu & is about to vomit. His whining, wheedling and wimpy voice are a perfect metaphor for today's lazy, entitlement minded younger generation. In short, Mr. Slade, grow a pair and stop whining about everything. A few trips to the gym wouldn't hurt, either.
What happened to music with harmony? To singers that could actually carry a tune as opposed to whine? Seems to be vanishing.
No doubt the groups fans, however few they may be, will strongly disagree with this and lambast me, but out here in the real world I know few who don't reach for the knob when the Fray's insipid whining starts up. Let the counter criticism begin!
2 of 3 found the following review helpful:
Very Good Aug 14, 2009
It is always hit and miss with alot of music I hear on the radio, and overall there are not may bands I can listen to for an entire album.
Alot of it is one or two good songs. The Fray are different, with a pop sense of hooks and melodies with sounds that are modern, but also reminds me of bands such as U2 and The Verve in their songs.
It carries throughout this album for a very nice and enjoyable experience from the start until the end. Well done.
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