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Rating:
In the long run, a machine ends up breaking down, no matter how much you've paid for it or how much you believed in it. That's the feeling I have for Incubus. To be honest, it's not that recent, it's been 10 years, with ups and downs, hopes for a comeback or visceral evolution, and crazy style declines. I discovered them through an additional disc attached to "Life Is Peachy" by Korn, which featured a live explosive version of "Hilikus," and it caught my attention, prompting me to rush to the (former) record shop in my city to purchase the gems "Fungus Amongus" and "S.C.I.E.N.C.E.," stuff that was mind-blowing. Sure, I realized the audacity with which Brandon Boyd mimicked his magnificence sir Mike Patton from the golden days of Mr. Bungle, without ever reaching even half of his alien expressiveness, but what I felt back then was pure joy and power, deeply into this crossover genre. So I dared to buy "Make Yourself," and again, shouts of joy, there was maturity and tracks to get lost in. Then came "Morning View." And from there, we return to the start of the review, the machine is broken, it hasn't completely stopped moving, but it does so with such slowness that it feels like it's going nowhere, and except for a few truly beautiful singles (so terribly repetitive and self-serving), there was no turning back. And so we come to this new work, "If Not Now, When?"; I ask myself that too, but the answer I give is "NEVER."
The album opens with the title track, a mixture of pop ugliness at remarkable levels with a seriously sickly sweet vocal melody, no peaks of the beauty of the good old days, tuneless warbles and boring string inserts, and the same thing happens until the third track ("Friends And Lovers"), so much so that they seem to be part of the same suite of terrible ugliness, and even the sounds... I'm surprised that sound guru Brendan O'Brien produced such drum sounds, but it's the case. It seems to move a bit more with "Isadore" with a hopeful melody, acoustic and electric guitar interplays dear to Einziger since "Drive," more dynamic, and the melody improves, the choirs are well-designed, but it's the edge of the abyss, another three terrible tracks, including the 7-minute suite "In The Company Of Wolves", where they attempt to retrace the hallucinogenic grounds of their mushroom-filled beginnings resulting in sickly sweetness, sounds lost in the space of a yawn, and it's not with a vocal filter that we will reach the shores of Mars' Turn. Pushing a bit more on the Patton-esque mimicry accelerator with "Switchblade" is useless, which live might attempt to get people moving. And as usual, a single saves the day, so to speak, and that's "Adolescent", the only true shining point of the batch, in a terrain of visceral boredom at its zenith.
I understand that at 35 years old, you can't be as impetuous as 15 years earlier, but that doesn't mean that perhaps what's missing is the ability to renew oneself, at this point, better to quit.
Tracklist and Lyrics
14 Dig (05:08)
We all have a weakness
But some of ours are easy to identify. Look me in the eye,
and ask for forgiveness.
We'll make a pact to never speak that word again.
Yes, you are my friend.
We all have something that digs at us,
at least we dig each other.
So when weakness turns my ego up
I know you'll count on the me from yesterday.
If I turn into another
dig me up from under what is covering
the better part of me.
Sing this song
remind me that we'll always have each other
when everything else is gone.
We all have a sickness
that cleverly attaches and multiplies
No matter how we try.
We all have someone that digs at us,
at least we dig each other.
So when sickness turns my ego up
I know you'll act as a clever medicine.
If I turn into another,
dig me up from under what is covering
The better part of me.
Sing this song!
Remind me that we'll always have each other
when everything else is gone.
Oh, each other when everything else is gone.
Oh! If I turn into another,
Dig me up from under what is covering
the better part of me,
Sing this song!
remind me that we'll always have each other,
When everything else is gone
Oh! Each Other, When everything else is gone.
Oh, Each other...,When everything else is gone.
16 Wish You Were Here (03:42)
I dig my toes into the sand
The ocean looks like a thousand diamonds strewn across a blue blanket
I lean against the wind, pretend that I am weightless
And in this moment I am happy
Happy
I wish you were here
I wish you were here
I wish you were here
I wish you were, here
I lay my head onto the sand
The sky resembles a back-lit canopy with holes punched in it
I'm counting UFO's, I signal them with my lighter
And in this moment i am happy
Happy
I wish you were here
I wish you were here
I wish you were, here
Wish you were here
The world's a rollercoaster
And I am not strapped in
Maybe I should hold with care
But my hands are busy in the air, saying
I wish you were here
I wish you were
I wish you were here
I wish you were here
I wish you were, here
Wish you were here
17 Nice To Know You (06:19)
Better than watching Geller bending silver spoons
Better than witnessing newborn nebulas in bloom
She who sees from up high smiles and surely sings
Perspective pries your once weighty eyes and it gives you wings
I haven't felt the way I feel today
In so long it's hard for me to specify
I'm beginning to notice how much this feels
Like a waking limb, pins and needles
Nice to know you, goodbye
Nice to know you, goodbye
Nice to know you, goodbye
Nice to know you goodbye
Nice to know
To know you
Deeper than the deepest Cousteau would ever go
And higher than the heights of what we often think we know
Blessed she who clearly sees the wood for the trees
To obtain a bird's eye is to turn a blizzard to a breeze
I haven't felt the way I feel today
In so long it's hard for me to specify
I'm beginning to notice how much this feels
Like a waking limb, pins and needles
Nice to know you, goodbye
Nice to know you, goodbye
Nice to know you, goodbye
Nice to know you goodbye
Nice to know
To know you...
So could it be that it has been there all along?
I haven't felt the way I feel today
In so long it's hard for me to specify
I'm beginning to notice how much this feels
Like a waking limb, pins and needles
Nice to know you, goodbye
Nice to know you, goodbye
Nice to know you, goodbye
Nice to know you goodbye
Nice to know
To know you...
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Other reviews
By IlSignorG
Incubus has never considered the risk of reverting to being kids again; their evolution progressively flirting with the mainstream hasn’t allowed for nostalgic diversions to old masterpieces.
Now they ooze honest mediocrity with tank-top songs and tear-jerker ballads, when things go well.
