Dan + Shay burst onto the scene earlier this year, when their record company may or may not have paid for an ACM nomination (the jury’s out on that one… honest). Their debut single ’19 You + Me’ hit the airwaves and gained a respectable top 20 peak, while their second release ‘Show You Off’ is just beginning to climb the charts. Their debut album, ‘Where It All Began’ hit stores on April 1 and went straight to #1, netting 60,000 sales by the end of their 7th week (which was last week), marking a pretty successful breakthrough into the public consciousness of country music. But is it actually any good? Well, on the face of it, we have two young, conventionally attractive men in their 20s, creating country pop music that appeals to teenage girls and is dripping with sentimentality and loving messages. Yet, that’s all we have.
You see, the problem that really arises from one full listen of ‘Where It All Began’, is not so much that every song sounds the same (within their identifiable brand, there is some variation), but that every song is about the samething. ‘What You Do To Me’, for example, tells of the butterflies felt when falling in love. Equally, ‘First Time Feeling’ is about a first love, ‘Nothin’ Like You’ revels in a women’s appearance and personality and the attraction he feels towards that, ‘Can’t Say No’ contemplates the notion of being helpless when around the girl he loves, and ‘Show You Off’, wanting to show off his girlfriend to the world. First time love, young love, infatuation, admiration. All basically the same narrative over and over. Then there’s the driving songs. Led by ‘Stop Drop + Roll’, they tell romantic stories of young love perpetuated by driving around aimlessly, with ‘Somewhere Only We Know’ and ‘Parking Brake’ key examples. Finally, the latter two tracks, ‘Party Girl’ and ‘Close Your Eyes’ celebrate the love found just staying at home and hanging out in pajamas in bed.
In fact, the only track that doesn’t toe the line of happy in love/infatuation is ‘I Heard Goodbye’, the first real ballad and one that stands out starkly against its compatriots. Far sparser in its production than the others and sporting piano and strings, it comes across both heartfelt and well-written, and I’m sure would be a big pop hit if released to the right markets and promoted effectively, as it reminds me of tracks I have often heard on the pop charts. Yet, this is a kind of depth not present on the rest of the album, and there’s only so many times I can hear a happy-in-love song sung and have it still sound fresh. After all, I’m not the only cynical bitch around here, and cynical bitches need depressing shit to listen to.
What my thoughts on ‘I Heard Goodbye’ also bring to light is the sonic content of this album. While in much country pop there is little evidence of twang, country instrumentation of themes of a typically country nature, ‘Where It All Began’ takes the biscuit somewhat, heralding bubblegum pop from the early 00’s as an example to lead by. When they get bored of that, we hear R&B beats and harmonies alongside pop punk/pop rock guitars and an energetic pace, with even a semi-rapped verse in ‘Somewhere Only We Know’. There’s plenty of hook “na na”s in ‘Stop Drop + Roll’, and Jack Johnson might sue them for copyright infringement on ‘Can’t Say No’, while tracks like ‘First Time Feeling’ and ‘I Heard Goodbye’ feel decidedly Swiftian. Mostly, they come across as bog standard boyband pop, comparisons to One Direction clear on ‘What You Do To Me’ (although as I’ve often said, they tend to be less edgy that 1D, which is probably saying something).
Of course, there’s nothing horrendously offensive about their music, and the pleasantries and romantics are likely well-primed for the target market. A huge plus in today’s country format is also the depictions of women in the songs – every women (or girl) has a personality, with the songs geared towards dating and a relationships rather than appearances, bodies and one-night stands. In fact, there’s not really any explicit sex references in any of the tracks, which comes across as rather refreshing for 2014, in both country and pop. I will also say their producer has a good grasp of the advantages of rhythm; for most of the tracks have some kind of syncopation and counterpart, with complexities hidden within the structure and playing off their delicately harmonized vocals.
The trouble is, it’s just a little bit boring. I feel like it’s one of those that teens will love and then grow out of, with little chance for it to appeal outside. And while the odd song I don’t mind for its ease of listening, a full dozen songs of mostly the same stuff does become quite dry, and indeed in the middle I became rather bored, especially with the polished production and banal invasion of clichés such as cherry red lipstick. It’s simply formulaic, and with its surface emotions and lack of really substance, it becomes mostly forgettable.
I just cannot promise I won’t dip in for a guilty pleasure now and then.
