{"id":364,"date":"2015-11-18T12:01:44","date_gmt":"2015-11-18T17:01:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/acutabove.wpengine.com\/?p=364"},"modified":"2015-12-03T15:28:08","modified_gmt":"2015-12-03T20:28:08","slug":"cope-and-hope-matching-songs-different-stories-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/acutabove.mipamsu.org\/?p=364","title":{"rendered":"Cope and Hope: matching songs, different stories"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Michael Carroll<\/strong>
\nThe Trojan Torch
\nPlainwell HS
\n1st Place
\nDivision 3, News Writing
\nReview<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Cope is dirty, loud, and defiant. From the\u00a0outset a wall of distortion and drumbeats\u00a0hit you. The pressure never lets up through\u00a0the record. The lyrics are at times delivered\u00a0clearly, but full of nihilism, and at others\u00a0are spat, bitter, and angry. Otherwise\u00a0generic heavy rock scores are given character\u00a0by singer Andy Hull\u2019s voice.<\/p>\n

People familiar with Manchester Orchestra\u00a0can expect the album to feel like\u00a0\u201cShake It Out\u201d off Mean Everything to Nothing.\u00a0Others should imagine something along\u00a0the lines of a grunge band circa 1980s, or\u00a0Brand New on The Devil and God are Raging\u00a0Inside Me.<\/p>\n

The best track would be \u201cSee It Again\u201d.\u00a0It is the champion for the sound in this album.\u00a0You feel the bass, and hear the venom\u00a0as Hull sings \u201cAnd I\u2019m never gonna see\u00a0it again.\u201d The worst, \u201cEvery Stone\u201d which\u00a0seems out of place with its comparatively\u00a0stripped sound, and the lyrics are sub-par.<\/p>\n

Cope has flaws: the songs can seem to run\u00a0together, at times the distortion is scratchy\u00a0and jarring, and the album isn\u2019t much for\u00a0casual listening. It is all it aspires to be, the\u00a0album was touted as grungy, and it delivers.<\/p>\n

The songs are loud and intense. The\u00a0lyrics are terse and explosive. You\u2019ll feel\u00a0young, alive, and angry at the world\u2014and\u00a0happy about it.<\/p>\n

8.5\/10 Stars<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Hope is everything that Cope isn\u2019t. Where\u00a0Cope is loud, and jarring, Hope is subtle and\u00a0smooth. Chords accented with gentle strumming,\u00a0piano taking the place of lead guitar, and\u00a0Hull\u2019s voice melodic and calming. The same lyrics\u00a0in Cope that were so bitter are now full of\u00a0exuberance, light, and love.<\/p>\n

This album is similiar to work of artists like\u00a0Margot and the Nuclear So and So\u2019s, Sea Wolf,\u00a0or Hull\u2019s side project Right Away, Great Captain!.\u00a0Within Manchester Orchestra, it is as if the\u00a0emotion of \u201cDeer\u201d from Simple Math and the\u00a0sound of \u201cI Can Feel a Hot One\u201d from Everything\u00a0to Nothing were blended, and extended into an\u00a0album.<\/p>\n

The worst song on this album would be \u201cAll\u00a0That I Really Wanted\u201d. It feels like the guitar is\u00a0too harsh for the rest of the album, and the vocals\u00a0still carry over the bitterness from Cope.\u00a0The best song would be the final song of the album,\u00a0\u201cCope\u201d. \u201cCope\u201d is the backbone, the spine of\u00a0this album. It provides a connection to the real\u00a0world, \u201cCope\u201d is where the line between idealism\u00a0and realism gets blurry, and it\u2019s the perfect\u00a0way to end the story.<\/p>\n

Hope can be at times tedious; the songs feeling\u00a0too slow, and too soft. The lack of any heavy\u00a0bass early in the album can leave songs feeling\u00a0too airy to truly resonate. However, Hope\u00a0wouldn\u2019t be what it is without these potential\u00a0flaws . It is meant to be the end of the spectrum,\u00a0something soft, clean, and beautiful. Hull\u2019s performance\u00a0assigns the airy quality, and piano\u00a0accompanied by strings bare beautiful melodies\u00a0to create the final product. Hope is meant \u00a0to be a soothing balm. When\u00a0you\u2019re hurt, when you\u2019re\u00a0burnt out, or when the bitter,\u00a0cynical world has torn\u00a0you down it builds you up.\u00a0Hope will make you feel\u00a0hope, that things aren\u2019t as\u00a0bad as they seem and that\u00a0they are getting better.<\/p>\n

9\/10 Stars<\/p>\n

Cope and Hope are perfect opposites. Individually they both send a\u00a0message, and they tell a story. Together though, they fill the gaps in\u00a0each other. No one thing is ever all dark, and none ever all light. Cope\u00a0and Hope together reflect this, and you get the whole story. Love and\u00a0hate in equal parts, each one real and genuine.<\/p>\n

Composite Rating 9.5\/10 Stars<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Michael Carroll The Trojan Torch Plainwell HS 1st Place Division 3, News Writing Review<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[4,56],"tags":[48,22],"class_list":{"0":"post-364","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-nw","7":"category-review","8":"tag-48","9":"tag-division3","10":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"featured_image_src":null,"featured_image_src_square":null,"author_info":{"display_name":"Kelsey Parkinson","author_link":"https:\/\/acutabove.mipamsu.org\/?author=3"},"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6K0n6-5S","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/acutabove.mipamsu.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/364","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/acutabove.mipamsu.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/acutabove.mipamsu.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/acutabove.mipamsu.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/acutabove.mipamsu.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=364"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/acutabove.mipamsu.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/364\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/acutabove.mipamsu.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=364"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/acutabove.mipamsu.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=364"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/acutabove.mipamsu.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=364"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}