Pop quiz boys and girls; Your debut album has become the best
\nselling debut album ever, with the lead single reaching number one
\non the billboard charts. What do you do? Well, if you’re Boston,
\nyou take two years to follow up with another album, one that is
\nalmost a carbon copy of the groundbreaking
\nBoston<\/i>. Is that bad thing?<\/p>\n
Think of it this way:
\nDon’t Look Back<\/i> was in the same boat as
\nStar Wars Episode 1<\/i>. Neither could live up to expectations,
\nno matter how incredible the product turned out to be. Also, put
\nyourself in Tom Scholz’s shoes; why would you mess with a formula
\nthat made you a great deal of money, and was widely accepted? It
\nwould be tough for most of us to resist. So here we are presented
\nwith an album that is derivative in every sense of the word,
\nhowever, it isn’t that bad.<\/p>\n
What made Boston a success (and the lack thereof which led to
\nlater stinkers like
\nWalk On<\/i> and
\nCorporate America<\/i>) was, among other things, that Scholz
\ncould write a catchy rock song.
\nBoston<\/i> had “More Than A Feeling”, so
\nDon’t Look Back<\/i> has the title track. One of the better
\ntracks the band has done, “Don’t Look Back” is the perfect arena
\nrock anthem. Loud, good riff to start things off, refrain full of
\nhooks, and in a touch I like, shifts in tempo, with spots for the
\ncustomary solo. If there ever was a formula for a hit single, this
\nis it.<\/p>\n
Everyone always remember the hits, so what does the rest of the
\nalbum have to offer? A few average tracks, a completely useless
\ninstrumental, and three of the best songs Boston has to offer. With
\nthe exception of “Feelin Satisfied,” the title track, and “A Man
\nI’ll Never Be,” the remaining tracks on
\nDon’t Look Back<\/i> are your average pop\/rock fare. As I
\nmentioned before, any of these songs could have also been on
\nBoston’s debut album, so after an album and half of the same songs,
\nthe second half of
\nDon’t Look Back<\/i> loses momentum. This could have been solved
\nwith a better arrangement of the songs themselves.<\/p>\n
How much you like this album depends on how much you like the
\nBoston sound. There is no doubt that the production on this album
\nis stellar, it just comes down the tunes. “It’s Easy” is a light
\naffair, “Don’t Be Afraid” has a strange, neo-country sound to it
\nthat doesn’t quite work, and “Party,” as it turns out is more of a
\nbar mitzvah. These songs have the standard Scholz treatment, but
\nfail to present anything new. Now for the good news.<\/p>\n
While there were many great moments on Boston, to me the
\npinnacle of the album was the opener, ” More Than A Feeling.” On
\nDon’t Look Back, that pinnacle comes in the form of “A Man I’ll
\nNever Be.” In a very un-Boston like move, the song opens up with
\njust lead singer Brad Delp and the piano, and slowly gathers more
\nand more momentum, and Delp’s vocals climb higher and higher, until
\nyou think the man is going to bust a nut. And of course, all this
\ntime, Scholz’s virtuoso layering of the guitars matches Delp note
\nfor note. This is the Boston formula, and it’s carried off
\nperfectly.<\/p>\n
\nDon’t Look Back<\/i> is not a bad record. It just could have been
\nbetter. I said this in my
\nCorporate America<\/i> review, but don’t get confused,
\nCA<\/i> and
\nDon’t Look Back<\/i> are not the same record, not by a long shot.
\nIt comes down to this; if you are going to get a Boston album, get
\nthe debut or the greatest hits, and you’ll be set.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":44,"featured_media":25830,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[5689],"rating":[5612],"class_list":["post-38138","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-boston","rating-rating-b-minus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/38138","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/44"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=38138"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/38138\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/25830"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=38138"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=38138"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=38138"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}