Lifehouse
No Name Face

THE REVIEW

First of all, it must be said that Lifehouse is not a real band, but rather a project initiated by DreamWorks Records in 2000 to showcase the talented and very young Jason Wade, who can therefore be considered the heart and soul of the group.

Active in the music field since he was fifteen, the young man (also the son of two American ministers) managed to create a demo in 1999, which today sells for thousands of dollars on EBay, and, the following year, at the age of twenty, even an album with his two friends Sergio Andrade and John Palmer, on bass and drums respectively; this album is indeed "No Name Face", which exceeded DreamWorks' most optimistic expectations in terms of sales by selling millions of copies worldwide.

Regarding the album, one can say that, despite the strong influence of the record company on the product, it is endowed with a good personality precisely thanks to the much-praised Wade, the songwriter of all the songs on the album and an objectively impeccable vocalist; the album alternates pop rock tracks (the singles) with more intimate and acoustic pieces, where the inspired and well-crafted songwriting is more evident; of course, the genre duality in the album also raised various criticisms of Lifehouse's debut, which we will nevertheless see later, with the already examined product.

The album opens with what is THE song by Lifehouse, "Hanging By A Moment"; to give an idea of the success of this track, it was nominated by the Billboard Music Award as the "most listened-to song of 2001", surpassing established artists like Janet Jackson and Alicia Keys, and was even chosen by Apple as a preloaded track on their 4 GB iPods. That said, is it a good track? I won't tell you it's great music because it isn't, but it is certainly a lively and catchy rock piece that serves well as an opener; it continues with "Sick Circle Carousel", which, in Jason's mind, would have been the driving single of the album; it wasn't, but it still offers such catchiness and immediacy that it could have been without a problem, along with deeper themes compared to the previous track, which are about our tendency to repeat the same mistakes rather than learn from them.

From here, the sound softens, gaining both melodies and more intimate lyrics, but with some qualitative mishaps: if "Unknown", "Only One" and "Quasimodo" can be considered successful and genuinely sweet and pleasant tracks, others like "Trying", "Somebody Else's Song" and "Simon" seem to me rather boring and excessively repetitive.

I devote a separate discussion only to "Breathing", the last single released, which I consider to be a great song, both in the melody chosen and in the songwriting: "I am hanging on every word you say and even if you don't want to speak tonight, that's alright" "cause I want nothing more than to sit outside heaven's door and listen to you breathing." and the concluding "Everything", with which Lifehouse, to put it in American terms, demonstrates that they know how to "save the best for the last": "Everything" is the most acclaimed song by critics and, despite its 6 minutes of duration, manages not to bore and to showcase the main points of the whole album, with an acoustic first part, then orchestral and rocking.

So, having said that, is it a good product? It is certainly an album that sparks discussion, as it is considered by the band's fans to be deep, questioning, and profoundly spiritual, while others find it "Commercial rock for the radio" or even "Too cheesy and repetitive"; I believe the truth lies in the middle, as it is clearly a mainstream product, yet certainly superior in seriousness and commitment (incidentally from boys who were only in their twenties at the time) to many other similar genre products, which if it attracts you, you could easily come to evaluate the album much more highly than I have.