Tomorrow’s album review today
April 10, 2003
Tomorrow Come Today
Boy Sets Fire
Wind-Up Records
After…
Tomorrow Come Today
Boy Sets Fire
Wind-Up Records
After two years, Boy Sets Fire releases Tomorrow Come Today on Wind-Up Records. Joining forces with producer Dave Fortman, the band tirelessly remixed and remastered for months on end. The result: a strange mix of pop, a little metal and something trying to emerge as Incubus’s twin every once in a while. Some may call it a “mature album” while others may recognize it as yet another over-produced effort fresh off the assembly line.
The radio-friendliness of Tomorrow Come Today blatantly mirrors the generic rock that has the parents so worried lately. The feelings evoked by the album are not excitement, pleasure or pure anger, but apathy instead. Once in a while a track such as “Release the Dogs” comes along that lets loose with scathing vocals and intense energy. However, the listener more than earns it after the sappy anthem, “Handful of Redemption.” The poppy melody and harmonized voices demand a “huh?” reaction halfway through the song.
The up-and-down motion of high-energy hardcore to whiny pop ditties is exhausting. Maybe this is the band’s adolescence when everything feels and looks awkward, but in a few years, things will be in place and emerge as something better, a metamorphosis of sorts. But at the moment it looks like they’re shooting for mainstream rock infamy.
With a lot less edge and a lot more emotion, high school kids will be going wild in the streets at the mention of Tomorrow Come Today. But, those old enough to buy cigarettes may cringe as they hear the bonus track “With Every Intention” and realize it should be on a Monster Ballads collection rather than a Boy Sets Fire release. According to the band, this track wasn’t even supposed to make it on the album.
Upsides to the album include – and are limited to – a socially conscious attitude, spontaneously good tracks and some great vocal work by Nathan Gray. Sadly, though, the radio bug has bitten yet another solid band willing to change to surf the airwaves.
