{"id":25186,"date":"2014-01-20T16:40:13","date_gmt":"2014-01-20T16:40:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/album-review-neck-deep-wishful-thinking\/"},"modified":"2023-01-17T16:53:45","modified_gmt":"2023-01-17T16:53:45","slug":"album-review-neck-deep-wishful-thinking","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alreadyheard.com\/staging\/album-review-neck-deep-wishful-thinking\/","title":{"rendered":"Album Review: Neck Deep – Wishful Thinking"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"Neck Deep<\/strong><\/a> are the band of the moment. A UK band rocketing from nowhere to the lofty heights of Hopeless Records<\/strong>, massive tours, and an adoring fan base in a little over a year. Are they really a pop-punk band of the majesty this implies, the result of the world\u2019s most well oiled PR machine, or something in the middle? \u2018Wishful Thinking\u2019<\/em> certainly isn\u2019t as bad as some corners of the Internet would have you believe but nor is it anywhere near as good as many others would posit. This is a record that sounds like the mean of every pop-punk record you\u2019ve ever heard, produced to the point of frightening squeaky cleanness.<\/p>\n

Opener \u2018Losing Teeth\u2019 <\/em>is a prime example. Here is a track that would have sat nicely on many Drive-Thru Records from the Early-2000s, albeit none of the legendary label\u2019s best releases. There\u2019s a good crunchy chug and a catchy riff, a few neat vocal trade-offs, and an unusual fade out given that it\u2019s the opener. \u2018Crushing Grief\u2019 <\/em>follows up with basically identical fare. Again, the track is solid middle-of-the-road pop-punk, although the choruses just don\u2019t seem to work. The track feels very much like two halves of separate songs stuck together to make one awkward whole.<\/p>\n

\u2018Wishful Thinking\u2019<\/em> carries on without much of note until the very end of fifth track, \u2018Zoltar Speaks.\u2019 <\/em> All feels done until it kicks back in with a key change that would make the cheesiest of boy bands blush. It\u2019s tacked on at the end of the track and it\u2019s just absolutely awful. If I could change anything about any record I\u2019ve ever heard, it would probably be the simple job of lobbing off this cringe-worthy escapade.<\/p>\n

After that the album returns to normal. In each track there\u2019s a pretty cool riff over the intro, the choruses all have a little extra energy, and there\u2019s a nice easy sing-along around 2\/3 of the way through. \u2018What Did You Expect?\u2019 <\/em>from the \u2018Rain In July\u2019 <\/em>EP makes a comeback just before the end. There\u2019s no denying it sounds a lot better on \u2018Wishful Thinking\u2019<\/em> than it did in its first incarnation and it\u2019s one of the standouts of the album, raising questions about the band\u2019s growth as songwriters since Neck Deep<\/strong>\u2019s inception.<\/p>\n

After 11 tracks of comprehensively okay pop-punk, Neck Deep<\/strong> decide to try their hand at what I suppose might be termed a ballad. They probably shouldn\u2019t have done. Up until this point every song has been alright but this is poor. The idea that any sad subject has to be slow and tired has long been destroyed, but unfortunately, Neck Deep<\/strong> appear to have missed the memo.<\/p>\n

Overall \u2018Wishful Thinking\u2019<\/em> is just too standard to feel like a keeper. It\u2019s a thousand records I\u2019ve heard before \u2013 many of them much better and many of them much, much worse. It\u2019s entirely unoriginal and the vocals often sound forced, leaving this record just feeling somewhat uninspired. \u2018Wishful Thinking\u2019<\/em> doesn\u2019t deserve some of the ire it will attract but in the end it feels pretty inconsequential.<\/p>\n

3\/5<\/p>\n

\u2018Wishful Thinking\u2019<\/em> by Neck Deep<\/strong> is out now on Hopeless Records<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

Neck Deep<\/strong> links: Website<\/a>| Facebook<\/a>| Twitter<\/a>| Tumblr<\/a><\/p>\n

Words by Thomas Knott (@nounandthenouns<\/a>)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Neck Deep are the band of the moment. A UK band rocketing from nowhere to the lofty heights of Hopeless Records, massive tours, and an adoring fan base in a little over a year. Are they really a pop-punk band of the majesty this implies, the result of the world\u2019s most well oiled PR machine, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":25187,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[5879,246,1047,8955],"class_list":["post-25186","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-album-reviews","tag-album-reviews","tag-hopeless-records","tag-neck-deep","tag-wishful-thinking"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nAlbum Review: Neck Deep - Wishful Thinking - Already Heard Staging<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Neck Deep are the band of the moment. 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