The Last Hero - AB Nation Discussion

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Will
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Re: The Last Hero - AB Nation Discussion

Post by Will »

Okay so I think I'm ready to talk about this album as a whole. The album was a let down for me and I'll tell you why.

I think the album took a step backward rather than forward. I felt that after Fortress(album I really enjoyed) this band was going to experiment more with arrangement and song structure and really push themselves as writers. Instead, I think they tried to hit on some things that worked before for them but this time around it just isn't as good. The album falls well short of Fortress and it certainly isn't close to Blackbird. I'm debating whether it's better than AB III... actually I don't think it is. This may be their worst album. I expected more from them even though the album isn't BAD by any means.

"This Side of Fate" is the only real song that feels like a breath of fresh air. "The Other Side", "My Champion", "Crows on a Wire" are good solid songs. "Island of Fools" maybe the most overrated song AB has put out. It's cool but if that is really the best song on the album than damn this album is mediocre. I don't think that is the best song on the album anyway. The mixing on this album kinda sucked. A lot of Mark's solo's don't even cut through and even some of the vocals not sure how this happened. I would cut "Losing Patience" and "You Will Be Remembered" off this album in a heart beat. Might even cut off "Island of Fools", yep I said it. It took until the 8th song "This Side of Fate" before I wanted to play a song over again. Never has it taken that long listening to an AB record, usually 2 to 4 songs in I want to listen to something again but that didn't happen. I'd give this album an 8/10.
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Timotheus
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Re: The Last Hero - AB Nation Discussion

Post by Timotheus »

So after all that, that's still an 8 for you? Generous..
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anguyen92 wrote:
Oh well. Deal with it.

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Will
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Re: The Last Hero - AB Nation Discussion

Post by Will »

My love for this band can't allow me to give a 7 i guess. I thought about it. lol
Timotheus wrote:So after all that, that's still an 8 for you? Generous..
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Re: The Last Hero - AB Nation Discussion

Post by Schulzy »

I gave it a 6/10 in my original review (maybe a 5/10 now) and agree with almost all of what Will said (I do like Island of Fools but my favorite song is The Other Side). I heartily agree with the other polls on top 5 songs and worst songs (You Will Be Remembered, Twilight, and Losing Patience). As a whole I do like it better than ABIII but still ranking it fourth in my book. It's just doesn't hit me the same way as ODR, BB, and Fortress did.
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Re: The Last Hero - AB Nation Discussion

Post by WaywardOne »

AB4Lyfe wrote:

I don't think they realize how awesome this song really is...

Ok, I'm concerned. Island of Fools not one of Mark's favorites? I used to think He could do no wrong but it seems like now his favorite things are my least favorite and vice versa... just worried his future material is not going to be interesting to me. Next Tremonti album will be very telling because things seem to be trending in the wrong direction.
Last edited by WaywardOne on Wed Oct 26, 2016 9:19 pm, edited 1 time in total.


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Re: The Last Hero - AB Nation Discussion

Post by WaywardOne »

anguyen92 wrote:^^ What do you mean by going in the wrong direction?
Island of Fools is one of my favorite and he doesn't seem to be too high on it... Last of Our kind solo is his favorite and I thought is was super boring... maybe I shouldn't have used that phrasing, but it just seems like he wants to move his music in a direction that I won't be as interested in. Not sure if that explanation helps but it's just a matter of my personal tastes maybe not aligning with how he's going to make music in the future. Too soon to say for sure.

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antiwal
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Re: The Last Hero - AB Nation Discussion

Post by antiwal »

Geez sooo much negativity on this forum at the moment, getting me down :( - can we just not allow ourselves to enjoy a new AB record? Its all good. Anyway, onto what I was gonna post about...

After hearing The Last Hero (the song) I keep thinking Myles would be a great choice for the next Bond theme song. I can just hear it would work so well! Just throwing that out there.

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Re: The Last Hero - AB Nation Discussion

Post by mikeyd23 »

Couple of things. I'm shocked that Island of Fools isn't a band favorite. It shows they might not have a great finger on the pulse of their fans if they think people won't want to hear that track live. Second, these behind the song videos could be so cool, such a great opportunity to really go in-depth about the songs, but I feel like it's a missed opportunity. They all have literally been Mark talking about a riff for like 30 seconds and then Myles talking about the lyrics for like 30 seconds. They could do so much more with these.

Seriously though, if they don't play Island of Fools on tour, that'll be a missed opportunity. Such a great song.

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Re: The Last Hero - AB Nation Discussion

Post by WaywardOne »

antiwal wrote:
After hearing The Last Hero (the song) I keep thinking Myles would be a great choice for the next Bond theme song. I can just hear it would work so well! Just throwing that out there.
Now THAT would be cool! Can you imagine the kind of exposure that would bring?? Myles would be a household name!

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Re: The Last Hero - AB Nation Discussion

Post by gbruin »

WaywardOne wrote:
antiwal wrote:
After hearing The Last Hero (the song) I keep thinking Myles would be a great choice for the next Bond theme song. I can just hear it would work so well! Just throwing that out there.
Now THAT would be cool! Can you imagine the kind of exposure that would bring?? Myles would be a household name!
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Re: The Last Hero - AB Nation Discussion

Post by Blackbird »

mikeyd23 wrote:Couple of things. I'm shocked that Island of Fools isn't a band favorite. It shows they might not have a great finger on the pulse of their fans if they think people won't want to hear that track live. Second, these behind the song videos could be so cool, such a great opportunity to really go in-depth about the songs, but I feel like it's a missed opportunity. They all have literally been Mark talking about a riff for like 30 seconds and then Myles talking about the lyrics for like 30 seconds. They could do so much more with these.

Seriously though, if they don't play Island of Fools on tour, that'll be a missed opportunity. Such a great song.
Well, Mark says that it will be a cool song to perform, so I guess chances are they're gonna play it live. Doesn't mean it will become a stable, but AB actually pay attention to the fans' reactions to their songs (that's why they don't play Show Me A Sign which is Mark's favourite song on ABIII, the reception when they tried it out was not good enough), so I guess if everybody's flipping the hell out when they play it, they might actually make it a stable.

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Re: The Last Hero - AB Nation Discussion

Post by mikeyd23 »

I hope they do play it, I think it would be a great song live.

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Re: The Last Hero - AB Nation Discussion

Post by Fish Tacos »

antiwal wrote:Geez sooo much negativity on this forum at the moment, getting me down :( - can we just not allow ourselves to enjoy a new AB record?
Kinda pointless to ask the people that aren't enjoying it if they could just enjoy it :lol Just sayin...
WaywardOne wrote: Ok, I'm concerned. Island of Fools not one of Mark's favorites? I used to think He could do no wrong but it seems like now his favorite things are my least favorite and vice versa... just worried his future material is not going to be interesting to me. Next Tremonti album will be very telling because things seem to be trending in the wrong direction.
It's an interesting thought, I personally like TLH but I can see why you'd say that. They also have the oddest selection process for their singles that don't really seem to match up with the majority view of what are their best tracks.

I know these guys view ODR and Blackbird as Era 1 and the last 3 albums as Era 2. I'm kinda hoping we move on to Era 3 or back to 1. Personally I'd love for Mark to revisit his roots and reframe his unique style of rhythm with what he knows now. I think he's so against "that old creed sound" and wants to show both others and himself that he's always progressing that he might toss out some otherwise great ideas.

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Re: The Last Hero - AB Nation Discussion

Post by anguyen92 »

Fish Tacos wrote:It's an interesting thought, I personally like TLH but I can see why you'd say that. They also have the oddest selection process for their singles that don't really seem to match up with the majority view of what are their best tracks.
I stated this before here, but this is why I hate the concept of the single. It's never going to be the best tracks of the album and whatever we think is the best song of the album would not do well as a single. Case in point, Cry of Achilles. People pushed them to have it as a single, they did, and it bombed, so now they got to reevaluate what could be a compelling single that gets people to hear the rest of the album.

I think they did all right picking "Show me a Leader" and "My Champion" (if it does get picked as an official single) as choices, especially where snippets of My Champion is getting played on Monday Night Football. No other song in The Last Hero can possibly get that coverage.

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Re: The Last Hero - AB Nation Discussion

Post by Blackbird »

Yeah, SMAL and My Champion are good single choices. Obviously not the best songs on the album, but that's standard for singles. The one thing that bugs me about the whole concept is that singles are expected to be played live. I'm fine with SMAL, but I really, really don't need to hear My Champion live if that means I'm missing out on something like Cradle To The Grave, This Side Of Fate or Island Of Fools, which is, sadly, very likely...

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Re: The Last Hero - AB Nation Discussion

Post by Fish Tacos »

I'm not sure I agree with that. SMAL's peak chart position is only 7 higher than CoA's was (20 vs 27 on US Main) so I don't think it's really fair to say one bombed and the other did ok unless you're looking at something else I'm not.

I went back to the Fortress fave song poll and saw Addicted to Pain had 0 votes but that wound up getting to 4 on the charts so I guess I can see where you're coming from. But even with that in mind I feel like beta testing it with the listening parties they have now where people aren't influenced by singles coming out ahead of time is a much better approach than just a blind guess. If I was going to pick a song for someone to listen to for them to get into the band off of TLH it wouldn't have been any of the 3 prereleased tracks they chose (and I enjoy My Champion).

I know they're trying to consider what's radio friendly and more "mainstream", but like, at least compromise then and pick a single from the top 3-4 polling results.
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Re: The Last Hero - AB Nation Discussion

Post by anguyen92 »

Show Me A Leader is still slowly (painfully slowly) climbing in plays, dang it. Once it dips below 400 plays a week and it hadn't hit top 5, then I can go ahead and say it bombs. Until then, I'm still optimistic.

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Re: The Last Hero - AB Nation Discussion

Post by AB23 »

TLH may have dropped to a tie with ABIII for my least fav album. I just don't even listen to several of the songs at all. Given that it's such a new album, that's not good. This sucks for me because I thought they were going in the right (ish) direction with Fortress.
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Re: The Last Hero - AB Nation Discussion

Post by One Drew Remains »

Didn't the band have a poll at the listening party for TLH? When they handed out the sheets for the album. Sounds like they do listen to the die hards about single choices.
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