Review Summary: Painful, excrutiating, horrible, god awful, etc. etc. etc. (pick any one, they all apply)
The Stereos (or actually, just Stereos) represent everything that is wrong with music. Not just today, but with music in general. I’m almost ashamed to admit I’m from the same country as them, but the fact is they’ve produced and released what I can say, without hyperbole, one of the absolute most worst albums in musical history. I’m not hating on this band just for the sake of it, I have given this album a fair and honest chance. And truth be told, there is a level of talent that’s underneath the deep, thick surface of this candy coated turd. But that talent is pushed so far back for ridiculous lyrics, inane and simpleton melodies, and layers upon layers of digitally altered vocals forming an album that is so over produced, it sounds like it comes from the very bowels of Hell.
For those unfamiliar, Stereos are from Edmonton, Canada. MuchMusic, the Canadian MTV, hosted a reality show called “disband” searching for the next big rock band. Out of the incredibly large country of Canada, they managed to come up with Stereos. The band won a record deal and guaranteed constant rotation of their music video as the big prize for the show. Long story short, Stereos released “Summer Girl” which became a hit in Canada. And now we have the album. Thanks, MuchMusic!
Let's start with the single, “Summer Girl”. All that needs to be said about this album is right here in this song: it’s an extremely simple rock song with the most basic of a basic pop chorus. I’m not joking or exaggerating, or even trying to take a cheap shot at the band when I say a 10 year old could’ve written this song. And the worst part about it is the fact that all of the vocals are autotuned. All of them. Not just Summer Girl, the whole album (even worse, the band is proud of it). Rock music and autotune don't coexist (remeber when Avenged Sevenfold tried it out? Ouch.), but you can thank Stereos for this groundbreaking formula as they produced a hit out of it. I’ll never mind the lyrics for a moment, and get to those later.
The rest of the album... well, every song literally sounds the same, except for “Butterflies”, the token ballad. Every song has a minor dance beat, roaring and soaring (but not too loud, don't wanna scare the kiddies) guitars, maybe some synths thrown in here and there, and digitally altered vocals, topped up with a pop hook for maximum radio play. I feel as though lead singer Pat Kordyback has absolutely no confidence in himself as a vocalist, or figures, it doesn’t matter if you can sing or not: polish it up with digital effects and the masses will eat it up.
Opener “Addicted” sets the tone for the whole disc, only the hooks aren’t nearly as strong (I use that term very, ever so loosely) as the rest of the album. “Get With You” has a slightly hip hop-ish beat with some handclapping, and again a ton of autotuned vocals. To say it sounds jarring and painful with the electric guitars would be too obvious. And describing the rest of the songs is futile… as I said, and without exaggeration, every song sounds the same, and it’s not a formula that works where you’d want to hear it over and over again. I mean, at this point, I'm writing more words than this crap is truly worth.
And that’s it. There’s nothing else to this CD. It’s hard to dissect something so simple, but really, that’s all there is to Stereos, both the band and the album proper. Every song is a tunless, immature pop/rock song with autotuned vocals, and all 10 tracks sound exactly alike. The end.
I’ll give points for “Throw Ya Hands Up”, which, despite having the structure of every other song on the album, does have a decent and driving beat to it. The aforementioned “Butterflies” has actual clean vocals in there, and shows that the lead signer has an okay voice somewhere in that maze of autotuned purgatory. I don’t like Butterflies, but I can recognize the minor level of talent in the song.
I won’t criticize the lyrics too harshly. Essentially, every song is about girls and having a good time. I know it would be too easy to dismiss that as fluffy and immature, but I’ll recognize that the Stereos don’t want to make deep music, and hey, there’s nothing wrong with that. They are targeting a specific demographic group here. That would be like criticizing Taylor Swift’s lyrics as fluffy and teenage-esque, nevermind the fact that she’s a young girl singing songs for young girls.
And that leads to my closing point. There’s nothing wrong with making simple pop music about having a good time (or girls, as it were). There are literally tons and tons of bands out there that perform and release decent pop music with fun lyrics. The 80s were a decade full of them!
Stereos, the album, is a piece of musical plastic, nothing more. It is a piece of crap created by a bunch of barely talented neanderthals who discovered the wonders of pitch perfecting computer software and went overboard with it. There’s no heart or soul in this album, and it’s as robotic and simpleton as the vocals.
It will not stay with you long after you listen to it.
Do everything in your power to never listen to this musical vomit, and if you absolutely must, don’t even think about paying for it. Stereos don't deserve it.
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