Thrashing Thru The Passion - The Hold Steady: Review
is a Brooklyn based Craig Finn fronted rock band known for detailed narrative songwriting and a blend of classic rock sounds with indie rock song structures. The bands third record 2006's Boys And Girls In America was released to universal critical acclaim and made the band an instantly recognizable name in indie music, but since then the band has released three albums of varying quality, none of which managed to quite match the greatness of Girls And Boys.
Review By Lavender:
I have always loved The Hold Steady, I first heard their landmark record Boys And Girls In America years ago and I was hooked from the very first moments. While I enjoyed 2008's Stay Positive quite a bit retrospectively the bands most recent album, 2014's Teen Dreams the only one I was conscious of at launch, was a touch underwhelming for me. I liked it more than most people as I expect will be the case with just about any of the groups records but I was still hoping to hear a truly great Hold Steady album fall into my lap live. While Thrashing Thru The Passion isn't the groups swan song or a groundbreaking sound, it is probably the groups best record since Stay Positive.
The band released a number of singles in the two years leading up to this record, a handful of which were scrapped and do not appear here. So 7 of these 10 songs we're released before the album and some of which have been out for quite a long time. Many of the earliest singles make up the second half of this record and it is a string of seriously fantastic tunes. The Stove & The Toaster is a hilarious song that oozes with 90's throwback energy as it pumps in extra instrumentation for a grand presentation. T-Shirt Tux is another funny song with a tight instrumental and an absolutely hilarious and infectious attitude that totally embodies the idea of wearing a Tuxedo T-shirt. Confusion In The Marketplace is a great character portrait and features one of the most conventionally sung choruses on the entire album, It is a great narrative and lyrical moment and an excellent closer to the album.
The two real gems in the second half of the song are Entitlement Crew and Star 18. Entitlement Crew has a killer horn section as well as a grand key breakdown. The best part of the song though is Craig Finn's performance and lyrics as he really gives this track his all vocally and there are more quotable moments per capita on this song than most indie rock bands achieve in an entire career. The crowning achievement of this album is a song I severely regret not including on my singles of the year list last year, hopefully I'll make it up to the band with my songs of the year list this year. Star 18 is one of my favorite tracks of the bands entire career to date with some hilarious lyrics delivered with sharp veteran charisma. Another element of the brilliance struck here is the great evolving instrumental that is busy at first but finds clarity through weaving in and out of the chorus and verses in a way that makes the track a brilliant and well connected track.
The final two singles from this year weren't quite as excellent but they still ended up being songs I enjoyed. Denver Haircut is the opening song here and while there is a lyrical moment or two that I don't love there is a great bright instrumental that works really well with Craig's dejected yet optimistic vocal performance. The most recent single You Did Good Kid is a track that didn't wow me at first but I've come around to the hook a lot. Despite the fact that a few moments on the song have a weird gap in space before and after it the hook itself is very catchy and the verses have a Nick Cave or Leonard Cohen style narrative to them that I totally dig.
So that's all of the songs that I knew going into the record, but the rest of what was here was decidedly less impressive. Epaulets has some great guitar work in its instrumental that is super catchy but it is mixed really loud especially on moment like the bridge where it manages to overpower everything. The track also isn't the sharpest lyrically and the catchy vocal melodies don't do much for me when the words seem so disjointed and random. Traditional Village is the weakest song here with a kooky stop and start instrumental that is way more annoying than it's worth. Once again I can't see much semblance between many of the verses here and I think the song defies itself a few times just to try and sound cool, this song really represents some of the issues I've had with the last two records.
The one other great song here is Blackout Sam which surprised me as a piano led ballad about it titular character. Diving into his woes in a classic folk manner is out of character for the group but I think they pull it off well, the song is both a sonically a change of pace and lyrically a great exercise in character development.
On Thrashing Thru The Passion The Hold Steady have tapped into some of the magic that has always made their music so great for just about the first time in a decade. The album has a hilarious and sharply executed attitude of wanting to be dejected but with a little fire of optimism that absolutely refuses to go out and the dichotomy provides consistently rewarding lyrical moments throughout the record. On top of the energy the sound is pretty consistently executed and the group has really come through with a solid indie rock album that not only returns to their conventional style, but stands out in a sea of indie rock releases this year. 7.5/10
