Music Reviews

So I have an extremely brave confession to make – AJR, their music, everything about them? I can’t stand them, not even one bit. So saying I was excited for this would be a flat out lie, but I was at least intrested to see where AJR would take their sound next – from the few singles dropped before the album, you could already hear a few improvements, so maybe AJR would stop absolutely sucking ass and start to make listenable music, right?

Well, that statement holds up to an extent – there is still an enormous ammount of overblown passages, that more often then not, just sound absolutely unexcusable and unlistenable. But this time around it’s actually mixed in with a few listanable passages and even whole songs?? Is this even still AJR we are talking about here? Well yes, they said it couldn’t be done but here we are – OK Orchestra sees AJR make their most consistent bunch of songs so far. Now there are still so manz things about this I can critique, but truly and honestly, my biggest complain this time around is definetly some of the one liners hidden in the lyrics – the politics on this album are sometimes just borderline enough for me to turn off the album (prime example being the song „3 O’Clock Things“). All of that is ballanced though, by the sound being way more richer and sounding like actual piece of music then on their previous efforts. To kind of take it track-by-track, we have the absolute mixbag that is „OK Overture“, which is like the definition of the word mixbag – there are some absolutely great passages on this song, burried beneath some absolute horrible ones, that make up for just one giant mess, that actually kind of works as an opener though. Nothing terrible, but nothing great either – one could say it’s just OK. Then the song „Bummerland“ is uh… Okay?? I guess?? The thing with AJR songs is that one never really knows how to feel about an okay-sounding song from them. Is it great? Hell no, not in you wildest dreams. Is it listenable? Well, yes, and that is kind of an accomplishment in of itself for AJR. Also by this point in the album, you start to take notice of the weird vocoder thing AJR has been experimenting with lately and well it’s not great, but at the same tame, it serves as kind of a breath of fresh air if I’m being honest. Now the song „My Play“ is, at least for me, actually one the songs that are just good. Yes, you heard me right – an AJR song that is legitemately good. There are a few things holding back from being actually just great, like some of the vocal lines and melodies, but the chorus on this song is legitemately one of the most statisfying and explosive things AJR has probably ever done. The follow up „Joe“ is a weird song, it uses beatboxing instead of actual percussion and mainly play-ground-like melodies on piano and sub-bass is also added on the chorus, but that’s pretty much it – it feels kind of rough and empty, though it’s not the worst thing in the world. The song „Adventure Is Out There“ uses some pretty impressive instrumentation at parts actually, especially the background guitar melodies are a nice touch, but overall it’s not the most impressive thing in the world, especially when you take into consideration some of the lyrics literally just being about socks. But at the end of the day, it is one of the more instrumentaly fulfilling songs on here, so I can look past that. What I CAN’T look past, is the absolute abomination of a song that is „BANG!“. The quality drop from the previous to this one is actually quite impressive – this song is just an unexcusable mess. Fortunately the next song „The Trick“ pickes up thing a bit, though not by much. The guitar plucking and orchestral instrumentation are legitemately beautiful, reminds of something Sufjan Stevens would do on „Carrie & Lowell“, which definetly was a huge inspiration for this one, though once again the song is plagued by some AJRisms, that just kill the vibe. The song „Ordinaryish People“ is so forgetable it’s actually painful. There literally isn’t anything I could tell you, I just finnished listening to it and I don’t recall a single passage or a note from this song, except the drum breakdown towards the end of the song, that was actually somewhat cool. „Humpty Dumpty“ is definetly a song, that’s for sure – though not a really good one. The instrumentation has some cool elements here and there, but the chorus instantly reminds me of something of „The Click“ – it’s just stomach-turning and giving me PTSD everytime I listen to it, which is a shame, because with a better chorus, this could’ve been one of the more enjoyable and, more importantly, listenable songs on this album. „World’s Smallest Violin“ just sounds like an accoustic Twenty One Pilots song with some extra trumpets added in – I’m sorry, but it just does. That being said, it’s not as insulting as some other songs here, so props to that. Now, the song „Way Less Sad“ is your typicall AJR formula, but done RIGHT. Once again it isn’t anything ground-breaking and on the surface sounds like something of of „The Click“, but it just for some reason sort of works. Not my favorite here, but at least it’s up there. Now we get to the closer „Christmas In June“ which is an OK (get it) way to close of the album. Definetly sums up the more mature, but still childish sound of this album pretty well. And the chorus is also catchy to an extent, so why the hell not, it’s a good vibe overall.

So I have done, I listened to a full 40+ minute AJR project without wanting to vomit more times then I can count on one hand – this definetly isn’t something I’ll be returning to, but it at least deserves some credit for being the most consistent and listenable thing AJR has done.

Decent 3/10