Harem Scarem
Higher

The painful notes: when it hurts, there's nothing to be done. From 2003 onwards, Harem Scarem have managed to nail maybe 2 or 3 songs per album. Perhaps the only ones that stand out are Overload and Hope, but for the rest, they have struggled as much as they could. Kudos nonetheless to Scarem, who have managed to deliver some truly excellent albums.

Higher, dated 2003, was perhaps conceived too quickly, arriving just a year after "Weight Of The World". The trend this time is towards melody, trying to create (very often in a bland way), a more refined product like the self-titled album. Track-by-track, are you ready? NO? It's none of my business!

We start with "Reach", a rather inconsistent song, with some good melodies, but it begins as it ends and doesn't provide much tone. Much better with "Waited", probably one of the best of the lot, with this time more fitting melodies and an excellent acoustic intro. Good work by Lesperance. Also enjoyable is "Torn Right Out", with excellent guitar inserts by Lesperance and a great performance by Hess on the microphone. "Give It To You" is a song that's overly simple, reminding me of the Rubber period, and therefore should be flushed down the toilet, and flushed hard. "Higher" is a somewhat dreamy semi-ballad but also rather ordinary. In the middle of the album, we have "Run And Hide", another saga of déjà vu, with the classic upward tone to make the song prettier... well, we'll see! Even the next one, "Lucky Ones", is decidedly boring, and "Lies" is on the same track. Saving the album from disaster is the beautiful "Gone", which features a good intro and especially a good rhythm. The album closes in a standard and anonymous way with "Lost".

This time, the review is shorter than usual because the album, alas, doesn't offer much beauty except for 3 tracks out of 10. Which is a bit too little. In my opinion, as I expressed at the beginning, Harem Scarem tried to take advantage of the good momentum created with "Weight Of The World", but in the end, they clashed with a set of songs that, if better worked on during the songwriting phase, would have created a decidedly better album; indeed, Higher sounds quite unfinished, without head or tail and also rather rushed.

The decline for Harem Scarem began and continued relentlessly until 2008, the year of their definitive breakup.