Sleeping With Sirens - Feel (10/07/2013)
Off the back of their growing popularity, Sleeping With Sirens, have released their third studio album, Feel. The album captures the band’s growing maturity with an exploration of different musical styles and emotionally driven lyrics.
The opening and title track, Feel, starts the album off with a slower tempo and the most mature sound I’ve heard from the band so far. The song is built on heavy guitar reverb, electronic stylings and Kellin Quinn’s dominating vocals, topped off with slightly cheesy but radio-ready lyrics. Feel is a song written to be played to large crowds and even as a studio recording, the roar of a the crowd can almost be heard accompanying it.
As the first track released from the album, Low, is the perfect bridge between their previous works and Feel. The song also works as a great energy booster in the middle of the album with its relentless guitars and Quinn’s intense vocals just begging to be played to sold-out stadiums.
The second single of the album, Alone, is definitely a stand out track which features a unique mix of Quinn’s signature croon and him trying his hand at pseudo-rap vocals. The genre mash-up in the song of hardcore and rap is a mix that fits surprisingly well with the rest of the album, however Machine Gun Kelly’s featured rap verse sits rather jarringly in the song and would be much better left out of the song altogether.
The album also features a multitude of guest vocalists more known in the hardcore scene and from recent Warped Tour and Soundwave shows. Congratulations with vocals from Memphis May Fire’s Matty Mullins is one of the best of these songs, despite the cringe worthy voicemail opening. Quinn and Mullins have already proven they work well together with shared vocals on Memphis May Fire’s Miles Away, however the instrumentals on this track are a bit of a let down compared to the quality of the shared vocals.
Sorry is an absolutely stunning piano ballad, that while at first listen seems more fitting with their acoustic album If You Were A Movie, This Would Be Your Soundtrack, it is perfectly placed as the second to last track on this album. Quinn’s vocals are flawless throughout the song and create an intensely emotional apology and highly intimate moment in an album of radio and stadium ready anthems.
Overall, Feel plays a perfect balance of emotional venting, big rock anthems and pop-rock stylings, that seems to fit in with the rest of their discography as well as reaching out to newer fans. Debuting at third on the US Billboard Charts and fourteenth on the ARIA charts, this slightly more pop-driven approach to post-hardcore may just be the popular revival that post-hardcore genre and this band has been looking for.
Bethany Williams
The opening and title track, Feel, starts the album off with a slower tempo and the most mature sound I’ve heard from the band so far. The song is built on heavy guitar reverb, electronic stylings and Kellin Quinn’s dominating vocals, topped off with slightly cheesy but radio-ready lyrics. Feel is a song written to be played to large crowds and even as a studio recording, the roar of a the crowd can almost be heard accompanying it.
As the first track released from the album, Low, is the perfect bridge between their previous works and Feel. The song also works as a great energy booster in the middle of the album with its relentless guitars and Quinn’s intense vocals just begging to be played to sold-out stadiums.
The second single of the album, Alone, is definitely a stand out track which features a unique mix of Quinn’s signature croon and him trying his hand at pseudo-rap vocals. The genre mash-up in the song of hardcore and rap is a mix that fits surprisingly well with the rest of the album, however Machine Gun Kelly’s featured rap verse sits rather jarringly in the song and would be much better left out of the song altogether.
The album also features a multitude of guest vocalists more known in the hardcore scene and from recent Warped Tour and Soundwave shows. Congratulations with vocals from Memphis May Fire’s Matty Mullins is one of the best of these songs, despite the cringe worthy voicemail opening. Quinn and Mullins have already proven they work well together with shared vocals on Memphis May Fire’s Miles Away, however the instrumentals on this track are a bit of a let down compared to the quality of the shared vocals.
Sorry is an absolutely stunning piano ballad, that while at first listen seems more fitting with their acoustic album If You Were A Movie, This Would Be Your Soundtrack, it is perfectly placed as the second to last track on this album. Quinn’s vocals are flawless throughout the song and create an intensely emotional apology and highly intimate moment in an album of radio and stadium ready anthems.
Overall, Feel plays a perfect balance of emotional venting, big rock anthems and pop-rock stylings, that seems to fit in with the rest of their discography as well as reaching out to newer fans. Debuting at third on the US Billboard Charts and fourteenth on the ARIA charts, this slightly more pop-driven approach to post-hardcore may just be the popular revival that post-hardcore genre and this band has been looking for.
Bethany Williams