Saosin - Along The Shadow (May 20, 2016) Album • Page 58

oh Cove's feelings were hurt alright:

But all bands have their problems and we were no exception. It all started with one comment directed towards me. That seemingly small comment completely drained every ounce of confidence I had worked so hard to build up. Not only did it completely catch me off guard, but not one of my heroes stood up for me, let alone acknowledged that the comment made was truly uncalled for. Thinking you’ve let your heroes down in even the smallest way really freaking sucks.

I’m sorry if any of you feel ripped off from my live performances- I take that to heart because every night that I get up on stage, I’m doing it for you guys- for the fans who come to our shows and show us support. As far as smoking goes, it’s not something I intentionally hid but it’s definitely not a habit I wanted to broadcast or promote. Let me make this crystal clear, it’s not a cool thing to do. Anyone who says it is “cool” is flat out lying to you. We all have our demons and this is one I struggle with.

For a while now, I had been feeling like it was only a matter of time until my end with Saosin was going to come. I’m just glad I got to sing, write, and record songs with my heroes. For those of you who feel like my role in Saosin was a dominant one, for better or for worse, it wasn’t; every decision we made, we made together. Whether you feel like my departure is positive or negative, I really do wish Justin, Beau, Chris and Alex the best of luck and I will always support them in all that they do.

 

lol how casually cringe both of those statements are. they seem like embarrassing people.

 

that's putting it mildly.
Report: The Used File Restraining Order Against Former Guitarist

 

Cove really brought nothing noteworthy to the band, other than teenybopper lyrics and dumbed down vocal melodies that maybe helped the bug album appeal more to a mass audience.

His cleaned up recorded vocals are... fine, for the most part. But I firmly believe the bug album could've been incredible with Anthony's influence, assuming his ideas wouldn't have gotten squashed in the quest for hits and sales (IMO, the Achilles heel of this band during the period between TTN and ATS).

 

Most of that was Chris fwiw

 

Yeah you're not alone. I remember first thinking this when Underoath dropped Too Bright To See. Then when O (Disambiguation) came out, a lot of people were making that comparison again.

 

Lyrics during the Cove era? I might remember reading a blurb about that

 

I revisited In Search Of Solid Ground for the first time in years a few weeks back and was left still thinking this is a mixed bag. In retrospect, this is interesting how a few of my favorite songs remain the slower ones (Fireflies, The Alarming Sound of A Still Small Voice, Nothing Is What It Seems), which stylistically aren't far from what they then did on Sore Distress, Old Friends, or The Stutter Says A Lot. My biggest gripe is probably Cove's performance, and I don't mean only the pitchiness in some of his vocals, but some of the melodies just... don't work. They either sound flat or feel like they were struggling to come up with something catchy. It was quite the contrast in comparison to S/T where, as formulaic as that album was, it felt like every song could be a hit due to the amount of huge hooks. Changing is the worst case of this for me.

Another one being the Grey EP songs getting unnecessary changes, especially I Keep My Secrets Safe. The Worst of Me's ones are minor, but they were noticeable enough to bother me. Why Can't You See is the only one that sounded better in its final version, and it's no coincidence it's also the only one that was identical to the demo.

 

Translating The Name > Along The Shadow > Saosin >>>>>>>>>>>>> ISOSG

 

Oh man I still love self titled haha

TTN is still my favorite project from them and ISOSG is a bit underwhelming but I'm fine with Cove

 

I love the self titled too. Not quite as much as I used to and no where near TTN but it's a great record.

ISOSG was one of the most disappointing albums ever for me.

 

Along the Shadow is the only record I really return to, but Translating the Name I think is undeniably the “coolest” thing they ever made, and the Cove records I just can’t get into. It would have been interesting to hear a record with a third vocalist though. I know Tilian (Dance Gavin Dance) was in talks with the band to join at one point and the demos that leaked are cool. Circa Survive is one of my 5 favorite artists (because I couldn’t choose just one) though so I am also thrilled to have Anthony back.

 

Even as someone who, in the day, responded poorly to bands going a bit softer/simpler, I always liked ISOSG more than most and was surprised others didn’t like it. Even listening to it today it strikes me as a record that if it came out later, more people would have appreciated it and whisked away a lot of the criticism as people just wanting old stuff. Obviously hasn’t borne out that way, but yea it still sounds like a classic saosin record to me.

 

Woah, a Cove vs. Anthony debate! It's been a while since I've seen one of these haha

Count me as team Cove. The self-titled is my all time favorite album. Still enjoy it just as much as I did when it came out. But I immensely enjoy every Saosin album/EP to varying degrees.

Saosin>TTN>Along the Shadow>Black EP>ISOSG>The Gray

 

I can understand ranking S/T at the top of their discog, even if I don't... but does anyone put it there because of Cove specifically? That's something I can't wrap my head around. Anthony lyrics/melodies on that LP and Beau producing it himself in the style of TTN probably gives us one of the best rock records of that era.

 

Comparing anyone to Anthony is a losing battle. Cove is a fine singer (on record), but Anthony's lyrics, voice, and melodies are unmatched imo.

 

I'm team Cove as well. The self titled record fires me up like no other and I love Coves voice on it. The optimism he had after becoming the singer of his favorite band pours out of that record. I just ran a half marathon and I listened to Come Close on repeat the last mile of it.

None of Anthonys work with Saosin ever impacted me like the self titled. Also, the first time I heard saosin was when they opened for Senses Fail in 2006. I thought they sounded good enough to get me to buy their record.

 

Remember that first In Search of album original album art that everyone went "WTF IS THAT?"

And then they changed it?

I've never seen that happen again with any band.

 

The melted clock is soooooo much better haha.

 

So many things this band did are odd to me... including changing the cover because fans were angry haha. You're the artist. One of the negative sides of the SAO boards there. Then deleting all of Justin off ATS also sucked a lot. Would love to hear his additions to it some day.

 

Yeah the SaoBoard was definitely pretty toxic wrt how it valued its opinion over what the band wanted.

 

Idk man they made all their old music when I was like 6 years old and I don't even like Circa Survive but god damn Along the Shadow is perfect

 

Doing a re-listen of the entire discog today in honor of this thread. TTN is perfect. Self-Titled has the worst lyrics of any Cove stuff IMHO but I'm happy you guys all dig it. I think his voice sounds worse on it than ISOSG. Voices/I Never Wanted To/You're Not Alone are the only tracks I actually enjoy on ST. Some Sense of Security demo ruined the album version for me.

 

Idk weren’t the band very disrespectful to Tilian during his short “tryout” with the band? With that, the Used stuff, and just how Cove seems like a genuine nice person. I’m team Cove.


FWIW I’m a huge Anthony/Circa fan.

 

Whoa... stuff like Sleepers and Collapse follow a straight progression from TTN musically and deserve some love.

My sense is both Cove LPs had a mixture of a few pure Beau compositions worthy of the original TTN vision, a few Chris songs that were usually fairly solid, and then some pandery shameless radio fodder that probably had heavily influence from the producer(s) and record company.