Healer - Grouplove: Review
is a Los Angeles based pop rock band who blew up early last decade with their breakout hit song Tongue Tied. Since then they have released four records over the past decade and maintained a moderate level of commercial success throughout.
Review By Lavender:
Grouplove's 2011 debut record Never Trust A Happy Song was a fun catchy pop rock record that didn't take itself too seriously and didn't pretend to be anything its not. If this was the continuing approach the band took I think I could be consistently pleased with their discography but since this solid debut record I think the bands sound has gotten weaker and more derivative with each release, culminating in Healer. The record is their weakest to date and a textbook example on how not to write a compelling hook over and over again.
The lead single Deleter failed to impress me earlier this year and most of the record is in line with its sound. The track is a corny pop rock number with a pretty flat hook that gets old really quick and the sugary production on the guitar licks is way too crystal clear that ts painful. Places is a dreamy distant tune with absolutely nothing tangible to grab onto that shows up and disappears with no seemingly no point. Ahead Of Myself is a painfully sweet track with some generic youthisms thrown in and some decent chanted vocals that lead up to yet another very flat hook.
Speaking of flat hooks the record is absolutey full of them. For a pop rock record the biggest flaws the album has is terrible choruses and awful singing which makes me wonder how this is the same band that made Never Trust A Happy Song less than a decade ago. Inside Out is the records first true disaster which features both of these flaws big time. The instrumental is super boring and there isn't much of anything in this track I would ever want to return to. The Great Unknown is a candidate for worst track here with some uneventful verses and one of the cringiest most painful hooks I think I've ever heard in my entire life and it causes some serious serious second hand embarrassment just to listen to. Promises has some silly political commentary that adds up to nothing, the instrumental is tolerable but the chorus is another terrible letdown. Finally Hail To The Queen features what may be the worst singing on the entire record and is impossible to love I just don't understand how this project has gone so far downhill so fast.
The record isn't all bad thankfully and has a few highlights. The second single from the record Youth was a big improvement from the first one with bustling keys and a smooth bassline. Once again the hook is the weakest part of the song and holds it back a bit but the song is still one of the better tracks here. The closing track This Is Everything is a decent closer I like the dreary ballad performance and sparse instrumental. It isn't a definitive statement of anything but it does have a slow but compelling build.
The records best songs do have some personality, but they both have super obvious reference points. Expectations has some glittery synth lines in its instrumental and some slick falsetto vocals. The combination is straight out of the Glass Animals book and plays out pretty well on the track. Burial on the other hand comes straight out of Arcade Fire's Funeral but with a little bit worse vocals and instrumental complexity. That being said it is still a huge upgrade over everything else here and is one of the only tracks that is really flush with personality.
There was a point in time where it felt like Grouplove could make some reliable pop rock bangers with a fun youthful attitude and a snappy hook, but those days are long gone in 2020. Healer is the bands worst record yet and I'm not sure if I will even be curious enough to stick around and listen to another Grouplove record in a few years, given that each record has been weaker than the one before it. 3/10
