Customer Reviews

Unwind

5 star:		(37)
4 star:		(7)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

I'm a fan of many kinds of music. I like everything from classic rock to modern music and everything from the light ballads of the Goo Goo Dolls to the hardcore beat of Linkin Park. But one thing I've noticed is that although I like hundred's of songs, rarely does an artist put out an album where you don't dislike one or two songs, and you skip ahead when those tracks start to play. I never buy a CD unless I feel I'm going to like all of the songs (This would explain my small CD collection). Then one day, during a late night of homework at college, a saw a little video on MTV from a band called Oleander. The song was 'Are You There,' and I fell in love with it instantly. Well, I did what any normal college student would do, and I decided to do a little online investigating with MP3's. After a couple downloads, I realized that I might finally have found the nearest thing to perfection; a CD with all great songs (perfection being a CD with only your favorites songs, which doesn't happen without burning your own). The next day, I was at the music store (proof that Napster can actually help you discover lesser known artist and lead you to buy their music). Unwind is now the pride and joy of my music collection. Here's the scoop. The second word that comes to mind when describing this album is 'complete' (the first being 'great'). It has good music from start to finish. Everyone I know thinks 'Are You There' is great. 'Champion' and 'Halo' are slower, powerful, touching melodies that grab your attention. 'Benign' and 'Tightrope' are also great, slower songs. The rest of the album is more punkish and still fantastic. In my opinion, 'Unwind' and 'Jimmy Shaker Day' were the low point of the CD, but after hearing them out once or twice, they grow on you and the next thing you know, you're tapping your finger along with them. Another plus was that the lyrics was clean. I don't care for, although I'll put up with, cursing thrown everywhere when you're listening to a song. It's clean enough for anyone, but don't mix that up with wimpiness. It's still got solid beats and most of the songs are pretty heavy (not heavy-metal heavy, but a good alternative/punk/rock type heavy). Definately do yourself the favor of grabbing this one, folks. And also check out Oleander's other album, 'February Son'. I don't have it yet, but I am buying it next chance I get, plus what I've heard of it (50-60%) keeps up with the Oleander quality. Unwind is great for anyone's music collection.

First I'd like to say that Oleander is one of my favorite bands. Very few bands have inspired the way that I write music more than Oleander has. I listen to a lot of music and while I don't think the band has completely rewritten the book of rock and roll I do believe they have added their own personal style to it and I think thats praiseworthy in itself. While a lot of bands are out there trying to ressurrect the ghost of Jimmy Page claiming that they're doing it for the sake of "bringing back the rock" these guys seem to appreciate the past but keep things in a direction of forward progress. Their major label debut was stunning, not a bad song on the album. Their harsh minor key musical warnings about going over the edge really grabbed my attention. All the while, they balanced it all out with a lot of upkey major sounding stuff that made a balanced creation. It was an album that could really stand on its own. I counted down the days and on March 6th I ran out to the record store and bought "Unwind," something I impatiently waited for. I've listened to the album about five times or so and I think its an excellent album that was well worth the wait. It seems that this time around that their style has gotten a slight bit of the pop treatment. While I felt that the treatment worked well for Fuel on their new release, I don't believe it served Oleander as well. The music seems a little more radio friendly than the cuts on February Son and lack some of that angst and aggression that really gave Oleander a distinct sound a couple years ago. What we hear on this album is a more mature and experimental Oleander. I think the experiment was rather successful for one. Where a song like "Lost Cause" or "Down When I'm Loaded" would have beat me senseless with balls to the wall rock attitude, songs such as "Benign" with its jazz chords and "Yours If You Like" with it's piano-like bridge picking really knock me over with some stuff I just don't see rock bands doing a whole lot of. Now that I think of it, I don't think I really see any rock bands doing a lot of that stuff. It may sound subtle but I think small experiemental things such as that do make a difference to the normal listener. Still though, they don't let us forget they're Oleander and how they got there. Songs such as "Are You There," "Jimmy Shaker Day," and "Unwind" still don't let us forget that these guys can rock out. They even add a bit of an epic feel to the agressive mix with "Goodbye" a song that kind of tugs at you emotionally. There's a lot more worth mentioning about the album but in a nutshell thats whats going on and I think it's something good. I would give the release 4 and a half stars but since there is no half star I'll round it up to 5 with the hopes that they're coming to see us here in State College, PA. I'll definately be there if they choose to come. Personally I think Three Doors Down should be OPENING FOR these guys just because they're so much better. Three Doors Down is a little more popular though so it wouldn't seem right to everybody else. However, this album has a lot of appeal. If you're an Oleander fan you will like it. Perhaps you won't like it as much as the first one but I do urge you to give it a good try before writing it off because this really is a good album that isn't a carbon copy of their first album. Doing a carbon copy would have been too easy. Pop-Rock fans would also find this a great buy even if they never heard of Oleander.

Oleander has been overlooked for as good as they are. anyone who really listened to their debut, February Son, enough to appreciate it would agree. Their follow up, Unwind, is one of the best cds i've heard in a long time as a whole. the entire cd is good, which is rare.

It's also a very versitle cd. it goes every which way. there are driving punkish grunge songs like "jimmy shaker day" and "unwind". they manage to keep their heavy quite nice vocally as well on "she's up, she's down" and the explosive "are you there?".

they show that they can write beautiful songs as well. songs like "halo" and "tightrope" are amazing songs; musically and lyrically. "champion" is also quite nice. these are songs that once you hear, you feel the urge to listen again...and again.

other songs such as "benign" and "goodbye" are so amazingly catchy and radio-friendly that it's quite shocking that this cd didn't do that commercially well. they're just so well-written and fit in w/ everything they play on radio. "yours if you like" is another song just like that. its just good. i really think they would've sold more cds if they marketed it in a different direction. a song like "back home years ago" would explode over radio.

THE POINT: this really is one of the best cds i've heard. it's one of my personal favorites that i always come back to. Oleander have a sound you could call Stone Temple Pilots meets Nirvana. That works for me cuz they pull it off beautifully. BUY BUY BUY

Favorite Songs (though, they are all quite nice):
1. back home years ago
2. are you there?
3. halo
4. tightrope
5. she's up, she's down

It all started when I was driving with my parents to go see my grandma, as I was listening to the radio they played "are you there?" I was thinking that I had to hear it again so after searching through some MP3s ..., I found the song once again, and thought to myself that I had to get there cd. Shortly after I got the cd and fell in love with it. Since I am in to just about everything including, melodic death metal, this was quite a turn around for me. The best song on the album is by far "are you there" Halo is a good slow song, and so is Champion. Songs like Jimmy Shaker Day are just so unique it's way too cool to hear them. All the songs are excellent. Mixed with an excellent vocalist the songs come to life. I recomend this cd to anyone who likes music period.

I bought this CD with great expectations. Their previous release, February Son, was one of the most surprisingly good CDs that I've purchased in the past few years. I don't know what it was, I guess I expected them to improve from one CD to the next. I definitely don't like this effort as much as the February Son album, but I'm not sure that I can say that it isn't as good. I believe the influence of other contemporary pop/alt. rock artists is much greater this time through. They became much more mellow and creed-like, and beside the single "Are you there", they left behind very few remnants of harder rock like was found in many songs on the February Son album ("Stupid", "Why I'm Here"). The new style that they play is more fit to what is popular at this time, and will most likely bring them much more success than an album similar to their last. The album starts very quickly with two fast paced songs, "Come to stay", and "Yours if you like(my personal favorite song)", that are perfect for a good summer drive. Then it goes into the single, "Are You there?". The CD then seems to begin to cater to the record companies, as it slows down with "Halo" and one of the stronger tracks, "Benign". Than the CD quickly reaches its nadir with the cacophonous title track, and "Goodbye", which actually has my favorite line in a CD full of ok, at best, lyrics("You don't need to understand -- Just give into the band"). The rest of the CD isn't weak, but it doesn't seem to be the style of music that Oleander "should be playing". The melodius undertones of "Tightrope and "Champion" are very catchy, and should keep Oleander on not only rock stations, but put them on pop stations also.

Since I hadn't gotten, or heard quite all of this album when I first reviewed it, and because I've never done this before, let's do a song-by-song of the album:

1.Come to Stay- Bouncy, kinda punkish opening track. Decent enough, but the chorus is kind of irritating. (3/5)

2.Yours If You Like- Kinda slower, with some pretty cool vocal work. (4/5)

3.Are You There?- The single, a bit different from any of their other stuff. Pretty good, but I've gotten a bit tired of it. Plus, as I mentioned before, it sounds a lot like the Deftones, who I'm not a big fan of. (4/5)

4.Halo- Very soft ballad. Not bad, but the use of metaphors in the lyrics is embarrassingly corny ("There's an anchor on my heart dragging me down?" O-kay). (4/5)

5.Benign- I guess you'd describe it as a power ballad. One of my favorites off the album. You gotta love that chorus, you'll have it stuck in your head for days. (5/5)

6.Unwind- Kind of a fast song to get things going after the back-to-back ballads. A good song, but not a great one. (4/5)

7.Goodbye- Kind of mid-tempo, with a heavy riff. Another one of my favorites. (5/5)

8.Jimmy Shaker Day- Based on the clip, I didn't think it'd be that good, but it's actually one of my favorites. Very punkish and catchy. (5/5)

9.Back Home Years Ago- Excellent ballad with very touching lyrics. Another fave. (5/5)

10.Tightrope- Kinda boring, really. I hear the Lenny Kravitz comparisons, someone else I'm not a big fan of. And, there's those metaphors again ("tightrope of razorblade wire"...groan). (3/5)

11.She's Up, She's Down- Once again, a fast song to get you going after the double ballads. Good song, but not real memorable. (4/5)

12.Champion- Nice little ballad to end it all. Kinda corny and Goo Goo Doll-ish, but I still love it. (5/5)

All in all, a very good album. The first one was pretty good, but not anything like this. This is one of the best new albums I've bought this year, along with Staind's "Break the Cycle", Tool's "Lateralus", and Megadeth's "The World Needs a Hero". I cannot recommend it enough.

If there were three words to make my description of this CD, they would be "genius, originality, and thoughtfulness." Some people may believe that it has a little bit darker mood and feel to it, but I beg to differ. I am steelblade16; you may remember me from a previous review that wasn't helpful at all to many of the readers, so I hope this will help somewhat. This CD is a uniquely crafted, one-of-a-kind masterpiece. And this band truly deserves more credit than they receive. If you don't own this CD, I would highly recommend buying it, and, at the same time, I hope you'll give it a good rating and find it great entertainment.

This album is amazing. Pretty much every song is easy to listen to and very catchy. "Are You There?" is a great first single. Benign, the bands second single, is also up there. Other good songs include "Come To Stay," "Yours If You Like," "Halo," "Goodbye," "Shes Up Shes Down," and "Champion." Oleander definitely did not fall into a sophomore slump, this is a great album and worth every penny.

This album has become one of the finest albums I have in my CD collection. It has all the parts that make up an outstanding CD: great (and relatable) lyrics, sweet and catchy guitar riffs and one outstanding singer. These guys truly overdid themselves on this album. I recommend ANY rock fan to check out this album... I personally guarantee that you won't be disappointed. If you don't enjoy and appreciate such great rock anthems as "yours if you like" then you aren't a rock fan.

I got to hear an advance copy of this new CD and it is AWESOME! From the opening guitar riff, through their great lead single "Are You There" and into the final track, it sounds even better than their major label debut "February Son" which was a great CD on it own merits. This new album takes Oleander to the next level. Their rockers are edgier than anything they've done before, while the ballads, "Halo" and "Tight Rope" will just blow you away! This one should take Oleander to platinum and beyond...Pick it up ASAP, you won't be disappointed!