It just feels very after school special to me. It's just so literal that it comes across as corny. But I know I'm completely in the minority. I like it musically, though.
I sort of get that but it's completely earnest. Jim has struggled with addiction and has been sober for 7 years now
Right. And I appreciate his candor with his struggle. If this song provides hope to anyone out there struggling then that is wonderful.
Chase This Light never really clicked for me. There’s a few highlights for sure (Dizzy) but I place it nowhere near their top 4 (Clarity, Bleed American, Futures and Integrity Blues)
It makes me wonder what album they found the band with. I started at Bleed as a teenager, so that always makes my scale a bit weighed down. The same way that Enema will always feel like a definitive record in my life even though I like TOYPAJ better front to back.
I think this is it for me as well, with the same records. The songs that don’t work on Chase are a clear step below those that don’t work on Bleed. Nowhere did I say they are bad songs or low points. Just not sustained peak.
I loved the Bleed American singles, jumped fully aboard with Futures, and loved that darker direction that they leaned into with Stay on My Side Tonight, but to me, Chase This Light was always the full realization of the "What if we really went for it as a pop band?" question that was implied by stuff like "The Middle" and "Sweetness." The polish, sheen, and sheer melodic punch of that record blew me away when I first heard it, and still really holds up. I go back and forth on whether I like it more than Bleed American. I definitely think "Dizzy" is their best song that's not on Futures. IMO, they were breaking new ground as a band for everything they released between 1999 and 2007, and I would really accept any order of those as their top four. I like all the albums that came after, but they're all chasing after that peak as opposed to really expanding the band's horizons, which is why I put all of them a cut lower.
I was listening to Invented on my drive home last night and to me that really is the final album of Jimmy (Part One).
That one always had a "greatest hits, but all new songs" feel to me. A lot of callbacks to earlier eras, and obviously working with Trombino again was a piece of that as well.
Chase this Light > Bleed American. I will put my name on that. And I found the band with Bleed American.