Chances are you\u2019re either going to love this album or hate it\u2014possibly even both.<\/p>\n
My own reaction spun the needle around 360 degrees more than once. The first time through, it was all bouquets and praises; the second time it was thoroughly irritating. And then I swung back around again as its rich melodies and catchy refrains began to infiltrate my brain at random moments throughout the day.<\/p>\n
Greg Holden has a shtick, and it\u2019s a good one\u2014sturdy acoustic numbers that gather momentum steadily until they break out into big choruses full of earnest affirmations and life lessons, gentle anthems full of inspirational nuggets. In the right mood, it\u2019s easy to get caught up in the sense of purpose that resides within these tracks. Holden is full of advice and directives\u2014\u201cHold On Tight\u201d; \u201cSave Yourself\u201d; \u201cGive It Away\u201d; \u201cGo Chase The Sun\u201d\u2014and most of it is spot-on and delivered with heartfelt sincerity and a hook that practically demands an audience sing-along.<\/p>\n
It\u2019s just that the paragraph above describes this entire album; what you get is one song like that, and then another, and another.<\/p>\n
Holden, whose keening, sometimes rather operatic vocals reminded me more than once of Nate Ruess (fun.), invests opener \u201cHold On Tight\u201d with great passion and conviction before delving further into the self-help songbook with the wise \u201cSave Yourself.\u201d \u201cNothing good is ever easy \/ you\u2019ve gotta save yourself \/ so you can find a way to save someone else… Keep movin\u2019 on, holding strong, let go of your mistakes.\u201d These affirmations work mostly because Holden simply wills them to; he is that earnest and that gifted. He saves the most important line of the song for the last, though: \u201cWe all need help.\u201d A simple truth that too many never manage to accept.<\/p>\n
It was about the time Holden sang \u201cIf you learn to trust what love can do, you will learn there\u2019s more to life than you\u201d that I began to wonder, though\u2026 Does he have any songs that aren\u2019t<\/i> message songs? They\u2019re all good messages, dressed up in well-crafted tunes, but\u2026 what else you got?<\/p>\n
Of course, like any good showman, just when skepticism starts to creep in, Holden finds a way to banish it again. \u201cBoys In The Street\u201d is a simple song that plays on archetypes, but familiar, powerful ones that hit like a sledgehammer when he reaches the final stanzas of a narrative about a gay man and his old-fashioned father working past rejection and anger toward understanding and love. <\/p>\n
And then he\u2019s urging you to unburden yourself from worries that are \u201cnot worth the headache\u201d (\u201cGive It Away\u201d), giving a friend permission to run away from his problems and start over somewhere new (\u201cGo Chase The Sun\u201d), and declaring that \u201cThe weight is lifted and I am free again\u201d with big dramatic airy production behind it (\u201cFree Again\u201d). Songs like these can strike you as trite if you\u2019re feeling tired and cynical, but they\u2019re undeniably powerful; Holden has mapped the DNA of the earnest acoustic anthem and diagrammed a strategy for maximizing the potential of each and every one.<\/p>\n
It was around this point in the album that I began to imagine Greg Holden as that instantly charismatic guy sitting in front of a middle-school assembly with an acoustic guitar who somehow convinces several hundred shy, awkward, somewhat jaded 11- and 12-year-olds to get over their insecurities and sing along. He achieves this effect with his own sense of urgency as much as the eloquence of his words.<\/p>\n
The album closes out much as it began. \u201cIt\u2019ll All Come Out\u201d holds back, then surges again and again, adding electric guitar to the big choruses for extra impact. \u201cI Won\u2019t Forget\u201d is more restrained, at first, but betrays a bit of a gospel preacher influence in its rolling cadences and late-song dramatics, another tune that seems to be about coming out and the resulting relief (\u201cI won\u2019t forget the days I lived in fear\u201d). Closer \u201cThe Next Life\u201d is the one curveball here, a country-tinged duet with Garrison Starr that ends up feeling like a campfire song-along\u2026 about dying and finding each other in the next life. It\u2019s simultaneously sweet and just a little bit creepy, definitely a different moment on an album that\u2019s otherwise consistent in sound and approach. <\/p>\n
So, here\u2019s my advice. If you\u2019re feeling upbeat and open, Chase The Sun<\/i> is just the thing to prolong the mood and encourage you to contemplate life\u2019s myriad possibilities. And if you\u2019re feeling dour and cynical, well, do you really want to stay that way? If so, avoid this album. If not, Greg Holden might just be the cure for those blues you\u2019ve found.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":32392,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[9644],"rating":[5617],"class_list":["post-44149","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-greg-holden","rating-rating-b-plus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/44149","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\/12"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44149"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/44149\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/32392"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44149"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=44149"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=44149"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}