The pulsing opening riff of its kickoff title cut signal the essential truth of Surviving<\/i>: after 15 years and four evolutionary and at times uneven albums, Jimmy Eat World has gone back to basics\u2014at least, basics circa their 2001-04 heyday. The familiar combination of raw urgency, keening vocals, muscular guitars, and alternately airy and dense arrangements immediately reminds of those twin beauties Bleed American<\/i> (2001) and Futures<\/i> (2004).<\/p>\n
That initial impression is only reinforced as \u201cCriminal Energy\u201d comes barreling in, a headlong, bruising rocker that burns as brightly as anything they\u2019ve hit \u201crecord\u201d on since \u201cFutures.\u201d When they move into the gentler, thrumming, ringing, tantalizingly familiar \u201cDelivery,\u201d the message seems clear: the boys are back in town. <\/p>\n
The difference, of course, is that while this is the same four guys who made those classic early-oughts albums\u2014Jim Adkins (vocals\/guitar), Tom Linton (guitar\/vocals), Rick Burch (bass) and Zach Lind (drums)\u2014they have nearly two decades\u2019 more musical and life experience under their belts. As a result, songs like \u201c555\u201d and \u201cOne Mil\u201d feature standard Jimmy-isms alongside more inventive touches. \u201c555\u201d opens with a looming synth backdrop, echoey handclaps, and layered harmony vocals before moving into a more recognizable syncopated, sky-hugging chorus. In similar fashion, \u201cOne Mil\u201d opens stripped down and acoustic before exploding into full flower as Linton and Adkins raise the roof while Lind bashes home the chorus.<\/p>\n
Lind kicks off lead single \u201cAll The Way (Stay)\u201d with a stutter-stepping groove that the others decorate with ringing riffs and a singalong chorus punctuated by urgent \u201cuh-ohs\u201d that are pure classic-Jimmy sweetness. In the midst of the song they deliver a verse that sums up the band\u2019s journey nicely:<\/p>\n
\nWe get discouraged by the pointlessness
And we’re pretty quick to judge things pointless
There’s what I want and what I need<\/i>
And the latter takes a while to see
It doesn’t matter how often, how old<\/i>
It starts with an awkward beginning
I believe that what I’ve learned has worth<\/i>
And what I choose to do means something<\/i> <\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\nAs was the case with both Bleed American<\/i> and Futures<\/i>, there\u2019s no drop-off on the back half of Surviving<\/i>. \u201cDiamond\u201d is a solid rocker with chugging verses leading to a pealing pre-chorus that triggers its assertive chorus. Then the highly evolved \u201cLove Never\u201d offers an anthem to mature love: \u201cLove ain’t some magical thing \/ Love never gonna be the way you’re dreaming \/ It’s gonna seem so far \/ It’s gonna feel so hard \/ Until you want the work more than the reward \/ Do you want the work more than the reward?\u201d <\/p>\n
\u201cRecommit\u201d is a classicist Jimmy ballad, all airy tension on the verses before releasing at the choruses. Finally, closer \u201cCongratulations\u201d burns hot through three minutes of coiled-tension dynamics before going full-on Jimmy-retro with an extended, experimental, and by the end careening coda that draws the track length out to 6:11. I can\u2019t say the coda adds much to the song, but it certainly shows the fiery spirit of the band is very much alive.<\/p>\n
You can\u2019t really call Surviving<\/i> a return to form, because Jimmy Eat World never lost it; the four albums from Chase The Light<\/i> through Integrity Blues<\/i> were all solid-to-very-good. Instead, Surviving<\/i> feels more like a rededication of the band, a passionate declaration that what they\u2019re doing still matters, that as they hurtle toward mid-life they still have something essential\u2014no, urgent\u2014to say. If this album is any indication, they do.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":33947,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[6683],"rating":[5613],"class_list":["post-45775","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-jimmy-eat-world","rating-rating-a-minus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/45775","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=45775"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/45775\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/33947"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=45775"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=45775"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=45775"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}