Ants From Up There - Black Country, New Road (REVIEW)

Black Country, New Road is a rock band and they make music. That is all I will say about them because I don't want to waste your time. The only reason I am even typing this review out is for variety purposes, it would be boring if I reviewed every album I liked. So please enjoy as I rant about everything this album does wrong.

Let me first clarify that I have tried very hard to like Ants From Up There. I've heard it about three or four times but I just cannot grasp what it is people see in this project. I think my main problem with this album is how highly it is praised despite being lackluster in almost every possible way. Fans of the band gawk over its 7th-grade-level concepts as if they were some ancient texts sent from God himself. I can feel the pretension beaming off of this record and anyone who might be a fan of it, but Godspeed to anyone who enjoys it I suppose.

Rock music is a genre of substance, alongside its concepts you usually have the instruments and vocals to accompany its symbolism and lyrical depth. Ants From Up There, however, carries zero substance throughout the very long 59-minute album, it is all style. Each track follows the same formula of starting off really slow and then abruptly screaming dramatically while playing loud instruments, it's boring and outright pretentious. The instrumentation is phenomenal on this record, but they don't do anything with it in order for me to expand upon that. And although I praise the band's great instrumental talent, it is completely pointless once you hear the lead singer, Isaac Wood's, abhorrent vocals. Whenever he isn't screaming simply for dramatic effect, he is just talking over the instrumental about absolutely nothing. It's a stretch to even give him the title of a "singer."

This album does absolutely nothing for me, to me it's just a pretentious rock album that critics can "ooh" and "ah" at. Maybe I will try and listen again in the future, but until then 1/10.