Walk the Moon release full-length ‘What If Nothing’
by Andrew Szendrey
2017-11-28
WALK THE MOON
What If Nothing
RCA Records · November 10, 2017
Walk The Moon: The only thing from Ohio to become a global sensation since the Wright Brothers took flight in 1903.
If your ears are still bleeding from the band’s 2014 hit ‘Shut Up and Dance,’ you’re not alone. The hit reached 25 countries spanning 5 continents, all of which are still recovering. But everybody deserves a second chance, right? Let’s give Walk the Moon one more shot on their first album release in 3 years: What If Nothing.
The album starts off with a heavy dose of the melodic synthetic beats that we grew used to on the band’s first two albums. The first two songs, ‘Press Restart’ and ‘Headphones’ are reminiscent of those albums. But, just like Talking Is Hard, What If Nothing falls apart during the third song. ‘One Foot’ sucks, but everyone loves it. I have a headache, because the déjà vu is too real.
Maybe Walk the Moon didn’t deserve a second chance after all, because almost every song after ‘One Foot’ hurts too. The choruses blend together, the melodies are independently repetitive and underwhelming, the ’80s synth beats should have stayed in the ’80s, and the auto-tuned singing wasn’t good when Jason Derulo did it, so there is no reason to think that it would work for Walk the Moon. Of the 13 songs on the album, the first two are decent, the third makes my head hurt, eight of the songs are pretty bad, and two are good. But I’m a generally positive guy, so let’s talk about those two good songs.
First: ‘Sound of Awakening.’ It’s good — not great. The lyrics have depth, but are hard to listen to when Nicholas Petricca’s voice is so synthetically modified. This is particularly strange when the fact that the song is primarily acoustic is taken into account. The instrumental version of the song would sound more like John Mayer than Walk the Moon. Yet, it’s obvious that the song isn’t by John Mayer, because then it would showcase some talent. So I tried to be positive, and it didn’t really work out, but the song had potential to be really good! It just… isn’t.
Second: The last song on the album, ‘Lost in The Wild.’ It’s pretty good. Unlike the last episode of How I Met Your Mother, I walked away without a bitter taste in my mouth. From what I can put together, the song is about learning to love someone when both of you are vulnerable. This is an important thing to write about, and has a surprising depth compared to lines like “I can take a beating from a good pair of headphones,” from the beginning of the album. I really did like this song, but unfortunately, that’s what made it unique from the rest of the record.
The newest Walk the Moon album offers very little in the way of quality music. However, it does provide everyday radio stations with 13 new songs to trick the youth into thinking that good music is all about the quality of the soundboard that the producer was working with. Walk the Moon didn’t deserve that second chance, and they won’t be getting a third from me.
