The Menzingers - Hello Exile (October 4, 2019) Album • Page 64

Idk, there's something to be said for simplistic lyrics. It's just that the band has been to this well so many times in their career that it's already bordering on cliche, so to directly name songs after the cliches/have lyrics so blunt and removed from some of the poetry on the other albums comes across as a regression rather than growth.

 

The chorus is beautiful in it's simplicity.

 

I don’t either, but I can understand why it would seem oversimplistic to some. But lyrical simplicity never really bothers me in music as long as it’s still meaningful.

 

While it's easy to nitpick a Pitchfork review, I don't disagree with a lot of the subtext of what Cohen is saying. The Menzingers stay in a lane with their sound and their lyrical themes so we know what we're getting and love them for it. To put it less eloquently:

 

I for one am shocked that Ian Cohen wrote another not good review

 

I find the song title / chorus criticism to fall extremely flat.

 

I feel like the criticisms in the review are exactly why people like them/don't like them. They are starting to become like a pop punk band, in that they always sing about the same thing. If you like that type of lyricism, great, you'll like most of their output. If it wears on you after an album or two, then this might not be for you.

 

Okay, they have boring lyrics on some songs on this album. Is that less flat?

 

Marginally. But to the extent that "boring" is attempting to relate some sort of objective criticism, I don't think it holds up. They have always had songs with fairly straightforward choruses. This record is no different.

 

I mean this is clearly subjective. I find the lyrics on this album, specifically the ones that are simplistic and explicitly stating many ideas that have been presented with more imagery, to fall flat. I think that a valid criticism of a band can be reusing the same themes or ideas album after album

 

i think "I Can't Stop Drinking" is my least favorite on the album. i pretty much skip it any time it comes on.

 

I think the directness of the lyrics (I won't call them simplistic, because to me that implies a negative) is part of the point. They're getting older and couching these things in flowery language and overwrought metaphors is a way of not dealing with them directly. But now that they have to steer themselves through adulthood (before they shipwreck) they need to deal with them head on.

I think this part of @Craig Manning's review hits on what I'm getting at quite well:

There's a way and a time to look back on those things and romanticize and glorify them, but at some point it's no longer that, it becomes just "getting fucked up with a high school friend".

 

As someone else brought up, the lyrics to the chorus of "Obituaries" are simplistic. They are blunt and to the point and I think they work because the rest of the song paints such a vivid picture.

EDIT:
I just want to make it clear that blunt, direct lyrics are often very effective. They can be much better than overwrought metaphors. I just don't think they work on this album, especially when these stories have been told by the band so many times before.

 

Like, this is a very bad verse. Every line is a cliche.

Put it up against a simliar theme or idea from the last album:

Idk how you could argue that the former isn't a regression.

 

Because it being a cliche is the point. The whole point of the song is how cliche it is that he's just "gettin' fucked up with a high school friend wondering where all the good times went".

 

I just don't buy that argument at all as a reason why the lyrics need to be so stilted.

 

All I’ll say is that ICTD is so easily the highlight of the album for me, ha

 

I actually do take this back, I Can't Stop Drinking doesn't really have the same cliches that I'm bothered by. Anna does, though. Last to Know also suffers from some of Tom's weak lyrics.

 

I don't find them stilted at all. I find that they fit the song quite well (or at least my interpretation of it) and that is my definition of good lyrics: they don't necessarily have to be poetic, or have any other specific quality, they need to serve the song. And here they do that for me, throughout the album.

I don't think "I Can't Stop Drinking" would be nearly as poignant as it is without the directness of those lyrics. That song is a gut-punch and the lyrics, for me, serve that perfectly.

 

I guess my frustration comes from the fact that ATP blew me away in terms of the growth in songwriting from RW and even parts of OTIP. I think it's a high point in the band's catalog in terms of lyrics, and I don't think that there is a single song on here (as much as I love Portland and Strain) that even comes close to matching the way that "After the Party" or "Your Wild Years "or "Black Mass" makes me feel. I feel like the Menzos have already struck the chord with me that "High School Friend" and "I Can't Stop Drinking" is attempting to hit, so it comes across as Menzingers-Lite. Anna, America, Portland and Strain have the actual melodies working for them, bout outside of a few lines I feel the same way. Farewell Youth has some pretty great verses, but I can't shake the feeling that the "older kids" line is pretty corny.

 

Craig summed it up really well in his review, I posted this yesterday but it applies to the discussion today too:

"A cynical listener could frame all of this as a retread, because After the Party already tackled so much of this subject matter in very resonant fashion. But After the Party was the growing up record, and Hello Exile is the grown-up record, and there’s a notable difference between those things. There was a bright punk thrash to After the Party that’s replaced here with creeping darkness and yearning Americana. The songs are quieter, slower, more subdued." - The Menzingers - Hello Exile • chorus.fm

 

Idk, I think that that "creeping darkness" has been a part of their music since their start. I don't see anything drastically different here

 

Would really describe nothing about After the Party as “dark” except maybe the last track, and that song feels like an epilogue anyway. So much of that album seems wry and tongue in cheek to me, whereas almost none of this one does.

 

maybe their goal was to reign in the lyrics a bit and get more to the point.

 

I think you're comparing this to the rest of their discography too much instead of letting it stand on its own. I bet it will grow on you the more you listen but that's just my two cents.