With Confidence were one of the bands that I first assumed would be the ones to replace All Time Low after they abandoned pop punk altogether in favour of electro pop after their switch to the Fuelled By Raman record label. They seemed almost positioned to be that follow up band, even working with the same record label that All Time Low did before their departure: Hopeless Records. On top of that, I had real hope going into this new album based off how much I enjoyed their 2016 debut full length album 'Better Weather', mainly because it was a rock album with pop elements rather than the other way around.
As such, I had real hope going into this album. All I was hoping was that the band would continue to play to their strengths and keep making heavy punk music and not get engulfed by the wave of pop rock bands going all out pop. So, what did we get on their new album 'Love And Loathing'?
Here's the thing. If, like me, your coming out of 'Better Weather' hoping for With Confidence to continue in the heavy pop punk vein, you may be initially underwhelmed by this album. I'll admit it, I was far from sold on this album even up to five listens in, but, when it clicked, 'Love And Loathing' by With Confidence is the kind of album that seemed pre packaged to be one that would appeal to me and tug at my heartstrings and refuse to let go. 'Love And Loathing' was the album that I never knew I wanted from With Confidence, but I'm so glad we got it.
So how did this happen? Well, the best place to start is the production where, in comparison to their debut, is significantly frailer and lacking in the same abrasive instrumental crush 'Better Weather' had. This will be a let down for a lot of people, and I would potentially even include myself in that category, but having listened to the album a good dozen times, I can confidently say the production on this album is pretty great. When the worst it gets is the more rigid melodic approach on 'That Something', and 'The Turnaround', you've got a well produced selection of songs. If there's one thing I will give this album plenty of point for, it would be the bass lines. In a genre where the bass can so often be swamped out by heavier production around the guitars, it's truly refreshing to hear songs like 'Spinning', 'Dopamine', 'Better' and 'Tails' where you can really hear the bass supporting but never intruding the main melody.
The melodic balance on this album is, overall, pretty breathtaking. From the simple, stripped back gentle guitar melody on 'Pâquerret (Without Me)', the tremendous hooks on songs like 'Spinning', 'Sing To Me' and especially 'Dopamine', and how the screamed vocals are mixed slightly further back in the mix to intensify the desperate mix of sadness and anger explored on 'Icarus', all these moments are truly excellent, but pretty much all the songs here work for very similar reasons: melodies. I criticised State Champs' latest album 'Living Proof' for occasionally lacking a lot of melodic cohesion; the melodies were often there, but swamped out by huge guitar and drum progressions. No such problems here as the melodies sit firmly at the front of all these mixes and hence the album can't help but stick in the brain.
The intense commitment to melody that runs across this album almost makes you wonder why the production team even bothered with the thin backing synth that runs through the verses on 'That Something', but that as well as the lumbering percussion groove on 'The Turnaround' really are the only time on the album where any blatantly synthetic instrumentation is used badly. You do get some more synthetic elements on some other songs like 'Better', but they are mostly pretty well blended and only serve to accent the main melody rather than overpowering it.
But, I've danced around the real reason this album works as well as it does for me for long enough, let's talk about the songwriting. The thematic arc on this album transcends anything All Time Low have ever written, even in their prime. In terms of albums exploring complicated feelings within relationships, it's no 'Astoria' by Marianas Trench or 'Melodrama' by Lorde, but it still shows a band looking to write maturer songs, and doing it right. It all starts on 'That Something' where lead singer Jayden Seeley is in love and enjoying himself; he's clearly under the impression he has found something truly special with this new person in his life. Even when the relationship enters its first stages of turbulence on 'Sing To Me', Seeley is convinced that they just need to hang on to each other.
However, this does not last long. 'Moving Boxes' is the first implication that something's gone wrong as Seeley describes the broken relationship, but how the lingering feelings (or 'boxes' that the girl has left behind as the song phrases it) are making it difficult for him to get over her. And, despite attempting to commit to getting over her on 'The Turnaround', he never truly does. He spends the next two songs wallowing in what could have been if he had done things differently, but the true dramatic turning point on the album comes on the album centrepiece track 'Spinning' where the girl that Seeley thought he said goodbye to for good earlier on the album comes back to him willing to try again.
Obviously Seeley accepts this offer thinking he's finally got his happy ever after, but it does not take long for the cracks to begin to resurface, and with it we get the album standout, 'Bruise'. Seeley describes the relationship as the pair 'pressing on a bruise just to feel something'. It's a heartbreaking way for the relationship to end, but it needs to for the better. Seeley even lets his frustrations with with himself out. After all, he did not let the relationship end naturally in the first place. Instead the pair are left picking up the pieces of the broken relationship, and any shred of dignity that was left from it.
You would have thought that coming out of a song like 'Pâquerret (Without Me)' that Seeley would have finally got over the girl in question, but 'Dopamine' proves that this is far from the case. To the untrained ear it may initially appear to be a love song in a huge anthemic declaration of love, but the reality is significantly more heartbreaking as Seeley hopelessly reflects on the previous events of the album and the struggle of having such huge lingering feelings and having no idea what to channel those feelings into.
But it's the closing track 'Tails' that might be the most interesting song on the entire album as Seeley reflects on the chaos that this chapter of his life has brought him and how it wasn't worth it. He links the messy relationship to the two of them 'chasing their tails'. In other words, not falling in love out of any desire to make anything of it, but simply for some kind of rush, any kind of rush. Undoubtedly the only way an album like this could end.
'Love And Loathing' by With Confidence is the kind of album that may divide fans of the band, but I can't help but love it for its rich thematic arc. It's an album about desperately trying to make the conscious choice to get over someone and the consequent struggle that comes with knowing it might not be possible, but ending in the pleasant note of acknowledging that if you are to grow as a person and truly learn from the experience, you need to turn your back on what came before, and keep striding forward.
I will restate what I said at the start of the review, I had no idea I needed this album, but now I have it, I have no idea how I couldn't see it coming as a natural progression for a pop rock band looking to write more mature songs and refine their production into something more pop friendly whilst still keeping a ton of the elements that made With Confidence so damn good in the first place. It's a 4 / 5, an improvement on their debut, and an album anyone slightly interested in pop rock should check out.
Rating: 4 / 5
Best Songs: 'Bruise', 'Dopamine', 'Spinning', 'Tails', 'Better'
Worst Songs: 'The Turnaround'
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