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Tree63’s new album Sunday! is a fast moving rocker that will constantly distract you with their references to other rock bands like the Police, XTC, U2 and Delirous. don’t get me wrong, the album is full of melodic pop rock with tuneful guitar riffs and big chorus hooks galore but the majority of your time will be spent saying to yourself, “it’s all been done before”. it’s arena-rock for the christian-set, but indeed it’s all be done before and for the most part, better, by bands like U2 and Coldplay. there are some songs that rise above the din but the by-the-numbers musicianship and copy-cat arrangements weigh down some insightful songwriting.
songs like Foolishness: What wisdom puts the prophet in a desert place, nobody to hear a single word he says? And what wisdom brings reward from suffering, where if I want to win I have to lose everything? has the potential to be *so much more* in the hands of better skilled musicians with more finesse.

and don’t get me started on the way the album sounds. it’s obvious the recordings were done on protools. it’s got all the tell-tale signs. the songs are way too-compressed to the point where all the instruments are *in your face* at a constant rate which will quickly fatigue the listener’s ears. also, John Ellis’ vocals are heavily treated with the much-hated autotune plugin. i really, really dislike the way autotune colors the vocals and i wish producers and engineers would just stop using autotune altogether. it simply makes the vocals sound robotic and sucks the life and natural-ness from the lead singer’s voice. just take one listen to the song Almighty Silence and you’ll see what i mean.

autotune is all over that track.

yes, you can find some great tunes on Tree63’s Sunday! but they’re unfortunately marred by both uninspired musicianship and the protools phenomenon (overcompression and heavy handed use of autotune). when all is said and done, I still prefer listening to one of their previous albums like The Answer to the Question.

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music, reviews by retroDan