Any rational, sensible person might assume that the following melodramatic, heartbreaking lyrics—just a few more hours until we are all alone,\ ""just a few last hours, we got to make this count,"" ""so close your eyes and kiss me like it's the last time""—are all from the same song. That rational person would be wrong, because these lyrics are from three separate, yet nearly indistinguishable, songs from Hawthorne Heights' latest album, If Only You Were Lonely. The amount of repetitiveness, redundancy and recurrence within this album's 12 tracks appears nearly too often to count.
One only has to visit the band's website to glimpse exactly what the problem is. The words ""she's in my bloodstream"" flashes on the left-hand side of the screen, immediately followed by ""she's so distant."" Apparently Hawthorne Heights itself is aware of its lyrical similarities, as again, these lines are from two different songs.
Try an experiment: Play the first few seconds of ""Dead in the Water,"" ""Pens and Needles"" and ""We are so Last Year."" Not only do they all begin with the same snare drum, kick drum-then-chord combination, but the latter two begin with an identical chord, which leaves the listener temporarily wondering if he or she accidentally hit the repeat button.
In a softer ballad, ""Decembers,"" lead vocalist JT Woodruff sings what is nearly the album's title, save for two words: ""If only they were alone."" Whether this was done on purpose (if so, why?) or if creativity simply ran dry, one cannot tell.
Billy Corgan of the Smashing Pumpkins once said, ""Great music completely obliterates any conceptions of genre."" Hawthorne Heights does exactly the opposite, understandably restricting itself to satisfy the fan base that gave them fame and who expected another The Silence in Black And White. This explains the album's most annoying overkill characteristic: Every single track on If Only You Were Lonely is about afflicted love.
Even within a prescribed musical definition, the new album is still unable to live up to the hype. Its first single, ""Saying Sorry,"" does not deliver the same forceful, genuinely angry and unquenchably catchy hooks as the band's breakthrough song, ""Ohio is for Lovers."" It seems that much of the scream has left the emo, and the band's backup vocalist and guitarist Casey Calvert has a smaller and noticeably quieter role. The only thing that remains to distinguish chorus from verse is simply Woodruff's slightly louder harmonized vocals. Hawthorne Heights can officially join the long list of sad boys with guitars.
Despite its many drawbacks, If Only You Were Lonely proves to be quite strong instrumentally. ""This is Who We Are,"" ""Where Can I Stab Myself in the Ears,"" ""Pens and Needles"" and especially ""Breathing in Sequence"" and ""Dead in the Water"" explode with cut-throat, barebones riffs that—at points—resemble metal even more than punk.
That being said, If Only You Were Lonely is yet another example of how the follow-up album is the hardest. When riding the popularity wave, time so often trumps quality.
\
