Collection of "Handwritten" Reviews

Did Brian get in a fight with that guy before he wrote that? That wasn't so much analysis of the album but just a load of insults and Springsteen comparisons mixed together.

ESPN, stick to sports.

The deciding review by the JADEDPUNKHULK:

HULK WOULD REVIEW THIS NEW GASLIGHT ANTHEM ALBUM BUT HONESTLY THERE ONLY SO MANY ZZZ'S HULK CAN FIT IN TWEET.

followed smoothly by:

AND ON THAT NOTE, HULK PROBABLY SEE YOU AT GASLIGHT ANTHEM SHOW TONIGHT UNFORTUNATELY.

AGoodTime wrote:

The deciding review by the JADEDPUNKHULK:

HULK WOULD REVIEW THIS NEW GASLIGHT ANTHEM ALBUM BUT HONESTLY THERE ONLY SO MANY ZZZ'S HULK CAN FIT IN TWEET.

followed smoothly by:

AND ON THAT NOTE, HULK PROBABLY SEE YOU AT GASLIGHT ANTHEM SHOW TONIGHT UNFORTUNATELY.

Haha I feel like JADEDPUNKHULK is a fan and Gaslight is the one band that he seems to have trouble being too harsh on. Like he always makes fun of them, but right after he says something really mean he always follows it up with a reminder that he apparently likes them. I look forward to his angry tweets about the show tonight, where I'm sure he will be secretly singing along and pounding his fists.

AGoodTime wrote:

This annoyed me quite a bit, not because it's a bad review, I couldn't care less about that. People think what they want. My friend wants to marry Justin Bieber for goodness sake. But because "sandpaper-voiced" and "lumbers where it should be nimble" are pretty big cliches. The guy doing the review gives Brian stick for using cliches (He does, but quite effectively in my opinion) when he does too (Badly in my opinion). Plus, the Guardian review of KOKO said that "Fallon jumped of the speaker and into the audience", so I don't take much notice of that paper anyway.

This has been an oddly received record in my opinion. Most people have great things to say, but there's like this subsection of writers that seem like they just wanted to prove their taste in music is astute enough to see past the Gaslight charm. I'm not against a negative opinion, but in what social realm is the term "Bette Davis eyes" a cliche? And the whole hero-worship aspect is such a stretch at this point that it just comes across as a recycled criticism.

sandyangryjohnnyormary? wrote:

I'm not against a negative opinion, but in what social realm is the term "Bette Davis eyes" a cliche?

I was assuming that I just don't get out enough to have heard that one.

Sounds like a dude looking for attention. Nothing more.

USA Today: 4/4
This is rock 'n' roll as we always hoped it could be: brutally honest, naked emotions and primal, cathartic singalong sounds that pour directly from one band's soul into yours. No posing. No sympathy solicited. On the quartet's fourth album, the Springsteen influence still echoes faintly — band and Boss share a Jersey background, a producer (Brendan O'Brien) and a penchant for arena-filling anthems — but here they stand on their own, barroom-tested and with plenty to say. Mostly, it's about love: lost love (first single 45), tormented love, redemptive love, love from a scorned woman's point of view (Here Comes My Man), love that carries you beyond the grave (Biloxi Parish).

And partly it's about the power of music to connect. As Brian Fallon asks on the title track, "What's your favorite song? That's mine, I've been crying to it since I was young. I know there's someone out there feeling just like I feel." We're here, and we do.

Washington Post: pretty positive
A short list of things the Gaslight Anthem’s major label debut, “Handwritten,” might remind you of: Bruce Springsteen circa 1978, 1981 and 1985; the Replacements; Otis Redding; that famous Levi’s commercial set to a Walt Whitman poem; Dropkick Murphys and the Clash.

The New Jersey-bred band made a name for itself with a series of indie releases that positioned it as an upwardly mobile Springsteen tribute act — a really great, incredibly derivative bar band with arena-sized aspirations. In “Handwritten,” the follow-up to its 2010 breakthrough-that-wasn’t “American Slang,” Gaslight Anthem finally have an album to match their ambitions.

“Handwritten” is rollicking and self-conscious, as eager and likable as a puppy, and BIG, all loud, bristly choruses and hearts-on-sleeves romanticism. A potent and unashamedly familiar synthesis of rock, punk and soul made by four men in love with their enviable record collections, “Handwritten” makes it clear that, by now, the Gaslight Anthem isn’t simply trying on a series of vintage rock poses on the way to figuring out its own sound: That is its own sound.

Lead singer Brian Fallon may be the only rock frontman who can sing about souls and moonlight and salvation without sounding ridiculous (and we’re counting Chris Martin). People are constantly bleeding from their hearts, taking things to their grave, talking to angels, putting on their party dresses, and generally doing things that make “Handwritten” at its most gut-ripping, which is much of the time, resemble the Tumblr of a teenage writer of Taylor Swift fan fiction. The only misstep: the florid grunge manque of “Too Much Blood,” which the band rumbles through like a turnpike Nickelback. “Are you scared this sounds familiar?” wonders Fallon, who surely must know the answer by now.

Stereogum: extremely positive
When the Gaslight Anthem first crossed my radar four years ago, I remember being overjoyed that a punk band like this could still exist, that there was still gold left in them thar hills. The Gaslight Anthem that recorded The ’59 Sound, their ridiculously great 2008 breakout, were proud inheritors of a brawny, no-bullshit Jersey punk tradition, one that stretched from the Misfits clear through to Titus Andronicus and Screaming Females. But the Jersey bands they most resembled were the Bouncing Souls and Lifetime, ’90s punk bands whose breakneck tempos and fists-up choruses never attempted to disguise the naked sentimentality at the heart of their songs. When I reviewed the album for Pitchfork, I wrote that they were the sort of band “who sing in full-throated groan-man bellows, who unironically cover old country songs, who heroically keep the hair-grease industry afloat.” My editors also took out some lines about how a band like this still wears newsboy caps, and how the frontmen of bands like this inevitably release garbage acoustic side projects. (Guilty.) Bands like this meant the world to me when I was a teenager, and I’m being completely real when I say that I don’t know how my life would’ve turned out if I’d never discovered them. A funny thing happened since The ’59 Sound, though. The Gaslight Anthem effectively stopped being a punk band. You’d think this would mean they stopped being great, but no. They’re just great in a different way now.

When The ’59 Sound landed, the Gaslight Anthem drew Springsteen comparisons like nobody since the Hold Steady, and the band sure as hell didn’t do much to discourage that impression. In the years since, they’ve shared the stage with Springsteen himself, including a must’ve-been-awesome appearance at Springsteen’s old Asbury Park stomping grounds. And for Handwritten, their new one, they teamed up with Pearl Jam producer Brendan O’Brien, the presumable reason being that O’Brien produced virtually everything Springsteen released during the past decade. And on Handwritten, the Springsteen comparison suits Gaslight frontman Brian Fallon better than it ever has before. Fallon’s open-veined bleat has deepened and thickened over the past few years. It was always a formidable weapon, but now it’s got a hearty growl that’s just a few degrees removed from Springsteen. And these days, Fallon uses his voice in the same wounded soul-singer ways that Springsteen always has. He doesn’t rocket through verses anymore; he lingers and ponders and lets the regret and heartache sink in. And O’Brien earns his paycheck by fleshing the band’s sound out with sharp little touches, keyboards or harmonicas buried deep in the mix. O’Brien’s additions don’t distract from the band’s ferocious thunder; they flesh it out in ways so subtle that you barely notice them.

The Gaslight Anthem already tried slowing down once. After The ’59 Sound, they released American Slang, an album that pushed their vintage-cars iconography even harder than they’d done before, pulling back on their all-out gallop and attempting to tap some deep vein of anachronistic Americana. It didn’t really work out. American Slang isn’t a bad album, but it felt thin and disappointing after The ’59 Sound. That was the sort of follow-up that just served to make the world wish the band would return to what they’ve always been great at. Instead, they’ve slowed things even further on Handwritten, washing away nearly ever trace of their basement-hardcore past. Handwritten is an unflinching, unapologetic arena-rock record, with all the blazing solos and grunge-derived riffery that the term implies. And it works. The band hammers away at that style with the same grand, severe sincerity that they brought to their old hearty bashcore. Their old Jersey punk connection lives on in the whoa-oh-ohs that they love injecting into their songs — the single most classically commercial thing that the Misfits gave punk rock. But they’re aiming for bigger targets: Road-trip playlists, sports-highlight-reel soundtracks. And amazingly enough, they never overreach; they hammer down on every big uncool feeling they shoot for.

In Grantland, Steven Hyden hammered the album for failing to live up to the precedent in one big, important way: The lyrical-specificity zone. Where Springsteen made small, localized tales resonate huge, Fallon is happy to wade around in doofy sweeping aphorism. That’s always been an issue for him, and some of the moments on Handwritten are among his silliness. On “Too Much Blood,” he actually worries aloud about telling too much truth in his songs, which is a pretty clear sign that he’s taking his own shit too seriously. But I don’t know; I like how silly and overblown and steeped-in-tradition his lyrics are. They way they read, it’s like Fallon is trying to will himself into becoming a background character in American Graffiti or something. And the funny thing is that the music is strong enough to push him there.

Handwritten closes with the most resolutely unpunk thing that the band has ever done: “National Anthem,” a string-drenched acoustic breakup ballad that could well turn out to be the band’s “Good Riddance (Time Of Your Life).” And it’s just a great song, swollen and powerful and catchy in its own schmaltzy way. It also final proof that this is a band uncool enough to attempt their own “Good Riddance (Time Of Your Life).” In 2012, that takes serious balls.

http://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/16856-handwritten/

5.7/10

That didn't even seem a particularly bad review. I never get how they can accurately put a number on music anyway, it's stupid.

bringiton wrote:

That didn't even seem a particularly bad review. I never get how they can accurately put a number on music anyway, it's stupid.

I don't care about the number as much as the review which I thought was pretty fair. It certainly doesn't deserve a bad review since it's a good record however it's not bad to be critical and point out some of the flaws on it. I cringe whenever I read all the reviews that are like 5/5 album of the year...best Gaslight album yet. It's like really?? are we listening to the same thing.

I thought that was a pretty good review, and hey, no Springsteen reference.

Spin Magazine has Handwritten under the 'Worst New Music' Section

http://www.spin.com/reviews/gaslight-anthem-handwritten-mercury

kinda surprised considering how much they have supported TGA in the past

Wow what did the boys do to that writer, haha. It seemed more like a bad review just because he/she was mad about something they did rather than actually thinks poorly of them.

I find it almost funny how badly people want to turn Brian into an egomaniac. Especially considering how there are so many obvious ego manics out there singing about how all these girls wanna sleep with them and Brian's basically saying "i'm gonna try and win your heart, and i'll be there for you but i know i'm not worthy of you"

Coincidence that this review makes it seem like Brian is an egotistical douche, and is the same publication that had that out-of-context "I've always been ready for arenas, I'm just waiting for them to catch up to me" quote that pissed Brian off?

StitchesOnTheRadio wrote:

Wow what did the boys do to that writer, haha. It seemed more like a bad review just because he/she was mad about something they did rather than actually thinks poorly of them.

I find it almost funny how badly people want to turn Brian into an egomaniac. Especially considering how there are so many obvious ego manics out there singing about how all these girls wanna sleep with them and Brian's basically saying "i'm gonna try and win your heart, and i'll be there for you but i know i'm not worthy of you"

"Unworthy to sit at the foot of your crown,
I can only let you down."

Truly the words of an egomaniac!

"The guy who once embarrassed himself with titles like "Miles Davis & the Cool" and lines like, "They burnt up the diner where I always used to find her / Licking young boys' blood from her claws,""
wait, what? this is just too funny.

oldgospelchoir wrote:

Spin Magazine has Handwritten under the 'Worst New Music' Section

http://www.spin.com/reviews/gaslight-anthem-handwritten-mercury

kinda surprised considering how much they have supported TGA in the past

Ouch. That review is BRUTAL. It's obvious he didn't like the record, which is his right, but the author seems to take particular glee not only in insulting the band, but also anyone who likes them.

case in point:

Quote :

With their pent-up verses of fatalistic despair crashing down upon their inevitable choruses in waves of rousing disappointment, this is rock as ritualistic submission to what's gone before, leavened with a little old-timey "whoa-oa-oa-oa" here and a little "sha la la la" there for the sake of singing along.
Admirers admit that this familiarity is integral to the Gaslight Anthem’s appeal as they lovingly list the band's influences. The obvious granddaddy of such proudly epic blue-collar defeatism is the cartoon reduction of Springsteen that's inspired so many pretenders to Bossdom through the years, from the Iron City Houserockers to Marah and beyond.

and

Quote :

As a lyricist, Fallon has moved beyond bald cliché to bland commonplace. The guy who once embarrassed himself with titles like "Miles Davis & the Cool" and lines like, "They burnt up the diner where I always used to find her / Licking young boys' blood from her claws," now settles for rote romantic lies like, "I would just die if you ever took your love away"; achieves blank epiphanies like "Nothing truly matters that you cannot find for free"; and worries about the effects ("If I put too much blood on the page"). At least back when he was paraphrasing Dickens and quoting Bob Seger in the same song, he was a distinctively clumsy writer.

I mean, come on. Who's really being pretentious here?

I appreciate well-constructed negative reviews because they make you re-think your position, but this one seems designed to show just how smart this guy is. That's not constructive criticism. That's just bitchiness.

Haha, I was cracking up while reading that Spin review. I wonder what they did to make the guy so pissed at life.

rubberducky wrote:

http://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/16856-handwritten/

5.7/10

I can't take reviews seriously that leave out Sink Or Swim. "2 albums and one side project later". Hey asshat, they had another album that many people love. Besides, this really isn't a bad review but know their discography before you write a review.

Oooh - it just occurred to me. Maybe this guy is shacked up with Anna (who lives in Brooklyn with The Cool). Maybe he is The Cool? Maybe he's a secret 5th Gaslight member who got kicked out years ago...

Or maybe he's just a catty jerk...

I love how Spin reduces Brian down to just a "32 year old Springsteen fan." Yeah, um, okay bro.

That review is just ridiculous. The Pitchfork review is an example of a negative review that I can respect, but the Spin one barely even talks about the album, just how much he hates Brian Fallon. I stopped caring about anything in the article after he said that "I've learned that nothing truly matters, that you cannot find for free" is a bad line...