Customer Reviews

The Wreckage

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I'm not sure how, but I had managed to go for the last 31 years without ever knowing who Will Hoge was...until yesterday when I was wandering around Barnes and Noble. They were playing this whole album start to finish on the speakers in the store, and it was amazing!! I immediately wrote down the lyrics so that I could figure out who it was later. His voice was strong, and reminded me of a mix between Rob Thomas and Pete Yorn. The lyrics really caught me... My absolute favorite was song was "Favorite Waste of Time." It actually got me slightly teary eyed while in the bookstore! After hearing the rest of the album I was hooked, and can't wait to check out his other stuff!!

As someone that grew up on classic rock from the '70s and '80s, and can't stand today's mainstream music, or pretty much anything that's been popular since the mid '90s, when I discovered Will Hoge's "The Wreckage", I was floored.

This album is a return to real rock. No boring, repetitive power chords, no drum machines, no screamo. Just real music, played on real instruments, written by the very same people performing it.

There's a fantastic stripped-down rock and roll sound throughout this entire album that, for me, evokes classics from Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, but still sounds quite unique. Styles range from the slower ballads of "The Wreckage" and "Goodnight/Goodbye", to punchy rockers "Favorite Waste of Time" and "Just Like Me", and takes you on a journey in between. If you like listening to the classic rock station, absolutely check out this album!

I heard "Even if it Breaks Your Heart" on a free sampler, and had to have the rest of the CD. That and the title track ended up being my favorite, but almost all the songs on this album are pretty solid. Check it out, you won't be disappointed! This guy definitely is not getting the attention he deserves.

I love Will Hoge, and you will too!!! Every song on the ablum is a hit! I had downloaded FREE mp3 album Ryko: Flash Of Light Sampler (Great) from amazon music, The first track was Will Hoge song even if it breaks your heart. I fell in love with the song and a went looking for his album. I want to see him in concert, hope to make it happen in 2011!!!

This is a great CD with heartfelt lyrics that anyone who knows and loves Will Hoge's music will appreciate! The music on this album is better than almost anything you will hear on the radio...a must have for any Will Hoge fan!

I first heard the song "even if it breaks your heart" playing in a local store on their music. I researched the words and found out who was singing. I downloaded the cd and was in love. Will Hoge has a sound that's like a combination of Tom Petty and Gary Allen. The words to the songs are passionate and heart-felt and I can't get enough. I couldn't have made a better choice.

Will Hoge is a soulful, rustic rock `n' roller whose career has mostly stayed under the mainstream radar. Yet he's not only turned out a consistent string of fine records over the past decade, but toured tirelessly in their support. His initial two albums with Atlantic didn't build a short enough on-ramp to stardom to keep the label's interest, but a few indie releases caught the ear of Rykodisc, for whom he's now releasing his second full-length. Hoge's music takes in the rootsy guitar rock of Mellencamp and Petty (the latter of whose singing style makes a big impression on "Long Gone," itself co-authored with ace songwriter Jim Lauderdale), but also the strained angst of Daughtry, the wavery worry of Gin Blossoms, the throbbing blood-vessel edginess of Joe Cocker, and the soulfulness of Paul Carrack-era Squeeze. There are blues and country edgings as well, as befits a musician who hails from the South and has repeatedly toured the roadhouses of America.

Recorded partly before and partly after a serious motor scooter accident, the album is only indirectly colored by Hoge's trauma and recovery. His themes continue to center around well-worn tropes of love, its struggles, pains and powers, and though he's mostly adding shading to that which has been written before, his voice carries the sort of emotion that explains why these topics persist and repeat in popular music. Even the album's title song is about the aftermath of a relationship rather than the physical collision that interrupted the recording of the album. Similarly misdirecting is the title "Even if it Breaks Your Heart" which strays from interpersonal tug-of-wars to take a heartfelt look of how music hooked Hoge into a lifelong calling. Rather than spending his recovery writing big picture songs, Hoge rededicated himself to the daily intimacies that add themselves up without a songwriter having to connect all the dots. 3-1/2 stars, if allowed fractional ratings. [©2009 hyperbolium dot com]

A cd that you can listen to all the way through, but "Hard to Love" and "Goodnight/Goodbye" are really great songs. Also check out his brother, Josh Hoge.

If you like Matchbox 20, Sister Hazel, Wallflowers, Vertical Horizon, or Fastball, you will definitely appreciate and enjoy Will Hoge's new album. He blows the Counting Crows out of the water.