Wednesday, March 28, 2012

the used - vulnerable


The Used have a new album out - it's called Vulnerable. I sent this news on to my bros, with whom I absolutely wore out the first two Used albums in college. The biggest fan of us all was my best friend Dan. Dan's response to my email was so good I'm just going to publish it, because I couldn't possibly say this any better. Take it away, Dan.

Dan, The College Years



The Used has been the band that I would have called my "favorite band" since high school.

Their first and self titled album, The Used, was the first time I heard a band do screamo well - and the right way; super intense, puke inspiring screams (where you can understand the words) and then ridiculously good modern rock vocals all in the same songs = post-hardcore.

Unfortunately I like that album so much, it could never be matched.  To this day when I listen to "Box Full of Sharp Objects" or "Taste of Ink" it makes me feel like I'm a 17 year old bad-ass, driving around Midlothian in my hatchback - and lets face it - there's no better feeling than that.

In Love and Death had a much more produced sound but I still liked 100% of the songs when it came out, and still do.  I think The Used lost some of their rawness as they gained popularity, but if you you listen to the story their albums tell you can see why.  They went from writing about becoming "alive" as they broke away from the Mormon  culture in Utah, to love (of drugs), to drug addiction, to being clean, and then about real love (of humans).

As we all do, they got boring as they got more mature. Sadly, Lies for the Liars was an awful album and I really lost hope for them after that.  I always wished I was a big enough fan of them that I could appreciate the development and change of the band and be a consistent fan --- not the case. Luckily, their first few albums will always exist and I can always be a fan of the albums, no matter what the band puts out there.

17, downtown Richmond punk rock show, Subaru hatchback, smoking cigarettes, 2am = The Used, self titled album

27, Winchester Target, SUV, investing in my 401K, in bed by 10:30pm = Lady Antebellum

-Dan


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