Louder than Yesterday Part.4

The Finest Work in the History of Music (in my opinion)

1. Chevelle - Wonder What's Next (2002)

Wonder What's Next is the second studio album by American rock band, Chevelle (formed 1995), released on October 8th, 2002 by Epic Records. Chevelle is a band of brothers. It consists of Pete Loeffler as the singer/songwriter/guitarist, Sam Loeffler as the co-songwriter/drummer, and Joe Loeffler and Dean Bernardini as former bass guitarists (1996-2005 and 2005-2019 respectively). This album falls under genres like Altermative Metal and Nu Metal.

To put it bluntly, this is the greatest album of all time. Not just in its genre, or its era. It quite simply is the most beautifully written and produced album in the 40,000 years of music history, and there is simply no doubt about it. One may ask, "Why? there's more hardcore stuff out there, songs that are harder to play, songs that are more influential based on how many people they've influenced. What makes this more special?"

Well, allow me to give you a little backstory.

You see, I was in a long distance relationship where I was being manipulated and my emotions were toyed with without my knowledge. I was told lies over lies that I impetuously believed so that the higher I was brought, the harder I'd fall. I was disposed of like I was worth nothing after six months of being told I was worth everything, and was asked to stay around so I could feed her more attention. This was simply the worst thing anyone has done to me so far. I was 16 1/2 years old at the time, and knew I needed an album to deliver me from this torment.

                                                       And there it was. Like a winged angel sent from above the skies to aid the emotionally wounded. It picked me up and stitched up every little dent and great trench in my sanity. It could not resonate with the unfolding of these events of my life more gracefully and flawlessly like it had. This wasn't just an album - it was a message from God himself.

And now, let's discuss the tracks in the expanded version of the album with 15 instead of 11 unforgettable masterpieces. 

Firstly, tracks like Closure, Family System, Comfortable Liar, and An Evening with El Diablo (tracks 4, 1, 2, and 10 respectively), have significantly helped me through my heartbreak. To clarify things, this blog is not to vent about my past relationships, but to talk about how this album is greatly a part of my identity. Closure talks about how I got all the answers as to why I should've ended the charade of being played with. Family System may have been about a dysfunctional family, but to me it was about recuperating from the anguish that lingered around me after cutting ties with her. Comfortable Liar describes the atrocities behind a relationship built on lies and the effects of psychological deception as part of a relationship. The song is her and perfectly describes the events that unfolded in my life. An Evening with El Diablo is about coming face to face with a person whose positive traits are superficial. It describes how people have facades of morally good people but underneath this surface lies the work of the devil (El Diablo in Spanish, as mentioned in the track title). In summary, it's about the contrasting initial and final perspectives on the individual. Here, the description of the track obviates the fact that I was led to believe that this person was a saint but turned out to be an antisaint (which is a reference to the track titled 'Antisaint' in Chevelle's fourth studio album, Vena Sera [2007]). 

Other tracks like Send the Pain Below (Track 3) helped me deal with the pain I felt from three events which happened in a span of three weeks. First was of course, the breakup, second was when I was hospitalized due to dengue, where I went through a lengthy week of physical, mental and emotional agony. Third was when my ten year old dog Simba, who was like a sister to me, passed away not even a day after I came back home from the hospital. All these circumstances exceeded the personal resources I had to deal with all this, so I needed a conduit through which all this anguish could be released, and I failed to find anything better. It was perfect.

The Red is their most popular song. It reached the top of the charts in 2003 in North America. The Red is Chevelle’s magnum opus. Not just because it charted so well, but because of what it represents. It’s the raw, feral embodiment of anger, trauma, and the moment where restraint gives way to eruption. “They say freak, when you’re singled out.” That line alone takes you back to that bitter place where you felt invalidated, misunderstood, pushed to your breaking point. For me, The Red wasn’t just a song. It was an outlet. It validated my rage when no one else would. The red is symbolic. It’s the boiling point. The final straw. The color of hurt seen through clenched fists and gritted teeth. It let me know that I wasn’t insane for feeling what I felt. In a world that tells broken people to just move on, this song tells you to eliminate the bounds that your rage knows. That’s the kind of saving grace this track is. It was an anthem for the emotionally wounded. 

Track 11 titled 'One Lonely Visitor', which is the original version of the album's closer, acts as a track that is meant to soothe you after almost every single track preceding it blasts you with its fury-packed vocals, aggressive guitar tones, and intense drum beats. It only consists of Pete Loeffler, and his acoustic guitar. No sound production, no drums, no amps, no distortion. To me, this album is like a therapy session where the client lets out all his rage almost throughout the entire session, and ends where the client is in a mood of tranquility and acceptance, where his heart no longer bleeds, but is stitched up and beating. It is a message that one must move on from all the dark places our emotions take us to, and leave it behind us for self-amelioration, where one finds peace and salvation. It can be through meditation, it can be through acceptance, it can be through finding God as well. No matter how it's done, someday we all must accept the agony we feel from life's challenges so that we are less affected by it in the future.

Tracks 12 to 15 on the expanded edition which consist of Until You're Reformed, High Visibility, Black Boys on Mopeds, and It’s No Good, which are meticulously and excellently written pieces that have the same weight as the main tracklist. Until You’re Reformed feels like a cold realization, a final acceptance that healing doesn’t mean justice, not to mention, it was featured in the 2003 Marvel flick, 'Daredevil'. High Visibility punches through with gritty energy, like walking away from a wreck with blood on your shirt but fire in your step. The band does a flawless job in covering this wonder of a Helmet track. Black Boys on Mopeds, a haunting Sinead O’Connor cover, is stripped and devastating. It’s No Good signs off the expanded version of the album by showcasing their ability to cover a song. And boy, did they deliver. 

In conclusion, as much as this album means to me, it's a must-listen to people who appreciate alternative metal, as well as those that are oftentimes angst-filled and need something cathartic that uplifts and reassures them. To those who are struggling with problems like heartbreak and those who are victims of emotional manipulation, this album is your saviour. It's by far the greatest possible thing you can listen to in times of adversity. It will rescue you like it rescued me, and you will never regret listening to it.

Louder Than Yesterday Part.3

 In the fifth and sixth grade, I never really listened to any music. Maybe it would be one song every couple days on YouTube that my dad would play in the car, or something I got from the soundtrack of a movie or a video game I was playing. Of course, the part of me which was highly opinionated in terms of music taste lived on, however, there was a dearth of music to learn from and to survive off of. It was like I saw it as an occasional tool to ease my mind off things instead of a drug where even one day without it would drive me insane. I guess, it's the feeling you get from the songs you hold the closest to your heart that I need an overdosage of every other second that I never really longed for in that short period of time.

This was until June 14, 2020. I was twelve and a half years old, and randomly decided to sign in to a brand new Spotify account. And as one would expect, it changed my life. I was introduced to newer songs by the day, was able to access all of my all-time favourites and gradually developed a strong addiction to music.

Spotify was a vast world of unlocking new feelings, new cures for depression, new emotions to channel, new experiences, and new songs to shape my identity, as well as my outlook towards life.

I was gradually drawn to this whole idea of seeing music as a drug. Each song instilling a different set of feelings that would make me addicted. All of them having their own atmosphere, meaning, vibe, it was almost along the lines of having my own vinyl/CD collection. 

I was new to Spotify at the time. I had this old habit of simply taking every single song that I fancied into one massive playlist indiscriminate of the genre from which it was. Era-wise, id say at least 95% of my music is from the 1990s and 2000s. As time went on, I realized my playlist looked rather unbalanced. A 90s pop hit followed by an early 2000's punk rock song was a bewildering sight to behold. So, I evolved as a listener (again), and put different songs in different playlists to make my profile look more organized as a reflection of myself as a music afficionado.

Spotify was, and still is the score to the motion picture that is my life. Some songs were to reflect emotions like fury, mirth, and sorrow, while others were to appreciate the art of the lyrical and melodic aspects of each song. It became an absolute necessity, not just for the attainment of a certain feeling, but something to drag me out of the darkest, most psychologically rotten places life dragged me into. But, we'll talk about that in our next blog.