Music Review Blog: Endings, Beginnings, and Follow-up success?

Evans Blue -- The Pursuit Begins When This Portrayal of Life Ends

It's hard to write a review on a follow up album I've anticipated since March basically because it's predecessor has been in continual rotation since I acquired it in early March of 2006. I was worried a bit about Pursuit when I initially found out because it seemed like a quick turnaround for a new band. While on balance not as spectacular to me as Melody... , Pursuit not only holds its own but has a number of strong efforts in its own right.
Of the 11 tracks, (10 originals and 1 cover keeping with the format of the first) 8 of them are played repeatedly here beginning with the driving, energetic "In a Red Dress and Alone." This song is emblematic of the growth of EB since Melody. The songs are harder on balance, though the softer ones are absolute gems, and Matisyn's lyrics seem more emotional and more intense than before. "Shine Your Cadillac" and "Q (The Best One of Our Lives)" continue the driving rock pattern with varying success. "Shine Your Cadillac" is more entertaining to me though it's hard to explain why. The first tempo changes hits with the emotional military tribute "Kiss the Flag" which is a great effort which has gained good responses from friends of mine who aren't even aware of Evans Blue or even fans of the genre. "My Damsel: A Confession to an Adversary" returns to the personal lamentation theme presumably, based on the "My damsel breathes fire" lyrics, recounting the story of a past dysfunctional relationship.
The jewel of Pursuit for me is the moving "Pin-Up" which downshifts the tempo and adds in well-arranged orchestral strings to convey a strong message again idolizing a significant other. Tori Amos's "Caught a Lite Sneeze" follows "Possession as the unexpected cover track for the album but like it's predecessor it's entertaining so no complaints here. Of the 4 remaining track I was not a huge fan of "Fear" which is kinda lackluster in comparison to those already discussion. "Dear Lucid, (Our Time is Right Now)" reminds me a little of "The Tease" from Melody as on first listen to me it was nothing special but it continues to grow on me. "Painted" is about a minute too long. It's a 9-minute plus effort with about 7:45 worth of material and 1:15 of Matisyn screaming. The portion of actual material is fabulous but the screaming outro seems forced and unnecessary detracting from the overall enjoyment. The album closes with the title track and lead radio single "The Pursuit" which is a solid modern rock radio track but probably fifth amongst the tracks here in playlist highlights.

Overall about an 8 out of 10 bolstered to maybe an 8.5 by the Melody Unplugged DVD in the Best Buy special edition.

An update for the one of you who asked

So, as became apparent by the complete lack of posts recently, I've been just a little occupied with work, life, and other stupid stuff to consistently blog. However, after this year's SHINE workshop went well, I've got a little time in BA to regroup and refocus. As usual no big revelations, other than one of my semi-artistic rants in verse is apparently being included in an anthology of some sort. I just have a few days to relax, attend shows (Counting Crows, 3EB and Collective Soul tomorrow, Upside Thursday), and review tunes which based on the new playlist additions may be a task.

Thanks for checking in.

Cool Video of the Day: "Kiss the Flag" by Evans Blue

Song Lyrics of the Day
"Forever is just some useless word you'd say
You threw it all away, didn't you?
I'll ever hope you someday feel this ache
You threw it all away, didn't you?"
Fuel -- "Forever"