I mean I agree a decent amount of that outside of the take on Some of It Was True. Hello Exile definitely diluted my interest in the band mostly due to the production, but Some of It Was True brought me back. It’s anything but a snooze fest.
Hello Exile kind of falls into where Get Hurt did for me. Has a few top tier songs, but ultimately falls short of am an amazing 4 album run proceeding it. SOS-Handwritten and CW-ATP are two of my favorite stretches by any artist and I feel pretty similar about the follow ups to those stretches.
I love this album, but I am a bit more of a casual fan than most people here. I like all of their albums a lot, but they aren't really that next level for me. I'd say Hello Exile is probably the weakest if I had to pick one, but it's still one that I liked a lot at the time and I still throw it on occasionally. I usually love their b-sides / one-offs that they release between / after albums.
hearing everyone say this one is their weakest album is bumming me out - it really undersells and ignores how much Tom brought his A-Game this time around
I'm also someone who tended to prefer the Greg songs usually, once I went back and looked at it, but on this one it's all Tom and it's not even close. honestly, Greg's sad sack relationship stuff over and over and over kinda drags it down a bit overall.
Last 3 albums are easily the best and the only ones I listen to but they were never one of my favorite bands.
yeah tbh their loosies tend to work well for me. the less pressure on them the more theyre able to crank out bangers. like my fav release of theirs overall is the hold on dodge ep