{"id":24467,"date":"2014-02-24T12:40:44","date_gmt":"2014-02-24T12:40:44","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/album-review-villains-villains\/"},"modified":"2018-03-17T15:33:32","modified_gmt":"2018-03-17T15:33:32","slug":"album-review-villains-villains","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/album-review-villains-villains\/","title":{"rendered":"Album Review: Villains &#8211; Villains"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/02\/tumblr_inline_n1b69zCTBt1qheirv.png\" alt=\"\" title=\"\">Born from the ashes of Never Means Maybe, Essex\u2019s <strong>Villains <\/strong><span>are determined to forge a new history as a new band. So they\u2019ve got a new name and a new sound. This band is a lot smoother in sound than their former selves, but they\u2019re better too. So all things considered, the rebirth can only be considered a success.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><em>\u2018Villains\u2019<\/em> isn\u2019t the most original sounding record. Nor is it the best of those it shares its sound with. That doesn\u2019t detract from the punch it packs though. Throughout this album <strong>Villains<\/strong> display an ear for arrangement that would turn the most seasons of pop writers\u2019 heads. In particular, the layered vocals presented frequently across the record, most notably in <em> \u2018Visions\u2019, <\/em> give it something extra.<\/p>\n<p>Musically <em> \u2018Villains\u2019 <\/em>fills that odd void between clean and gritty. Take opening track <em> \u2018The Way I Tell Them.\u2019 <\/em> There\u2019s a rasp to the bass that carries it along between crunching choruses but, for these rough edges, the whole thing is very neat, melodic, and softer than it would have you believe. <em>\u2018Bleed\u2019<\/em> showcases the slick guitar that winds its way through the album. Neat riffs between huge choruses give the impression of a song on a precipice, ready to plunge back into another mammoth hook. For all the smart guitar work elsewhere, it\u2019s the drums of <em> \u2018The Light Outlives The Star\u2019 <\/em>that mastermind the most excellent transition \u2013 from a soft, moving first verse to the best chorus on the record.<!-- more --><\/p>\n<\/p>\n<p>Now, ending your record with the slow one, even if it does have an obvious burst at the end is, as a general rule, lame. Please, bands of the planet Earth, stop ending every record with a slow, ballad type number that\u2019s almost always not as good as the album the came before it. Am I just mentioning this because <strong>Villains<\/strong> did it and bugged me at the end of an otherwise pretty damn good album? Yes. I am. Shall I drag this paragraph out a little too long; maybe use a whole host of nice sounding words to show you my softer side? Or shall I just leave the review, job done, where it needs to be left?<\/p>\n<p>Despite my annoyance with the last track (<em> \u2018The Hardest Part\u2019<\/em>), <strong>Villains<\/strong> could well be on to something here. It\u2019s not a perfect record, but it\u2019s more than a good start for a band looking to hit the ground running.<\/p>\n<p>3.5\/5<\/p>\n<p><em>\u2018Villains\u2019<\/em> by <strong>Villains<\/strong> is out know.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Villains<\/strong> links: <a href=\"http:\/\/www.villainsofficial.co.uk\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Website<\/a>|<a href=\"http:\/\/www.facebook.com\/villainsofficial\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Facebook<\/a>|<a href=\"http:\/\/www.twitter.com\/villainsUK\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Twitter<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Words by Thomas Knott (<a href=\"http:\/\/twitter.com\/thislifeishuge\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">@thislifeishuge<\/a>)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Born from the ashes of Never Means Maybe, Essex\u2019s Villains are determined to forge a new history as a new band. So they\u2019ve got a new name and a new sound. This band is a lot smoother in sound than their former selves, but they\u2019re better too. So all things considered, the rebirth can only [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":24468,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[15,8181],"tags":[5879,1304],"class_list":["post-24467","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-album-reviews","category-post","tag-album-reviews","tag-villains"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.7 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Album Review: Villains - Villains - Already Heard Staging<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Born from the ashes of Never Means Maybe, Essex\u2019s Villains are determined to forge a new history as a new band. 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