Third Eye Blind are still living up to the mass media attention that they deserve.
American rockers Third Eye Blind are back with “Ursa Major”, their first album in over six years. Their single, ‘Don’t Believe A Word’, was released on 10th May 2010.
I must admit that I was one of the grumpy music fans who was pretty relieved when college rock went out of fashion, purely because it was so monotonous ��" every new band on the scene wanted to be the next Sum 41 or Bowling for Soup. However, the guys of Third Eye Blind have taken this sound and evolved it to something original and very relevant for today’s market. The best bits of college rock are still evident but the mature vocal contribution, the heavy guitar riffs and the intense lyrics which cover a range of important topics such as politics in a sensitive but “cool” way will appeal to many young rebels out there. The album does evolve and incorporates hints of new fad indie in the more emotional songs that make up the second half of the album, but the heavy guitars, particularly in ‘About to Break’, mean that this is perfectly acceptable to real rockers who like to think that they don’t like mushy songs..!
For me, the best track on this album was finale ‘Carnival Barker’, an instrumental track which really shows off the band’s collective talent. Single ‘Don’t Believe A Word’ gets my vote as the best song on the album, the vocal harmonies in particular sending shivers up my spine.
What I like best about this album is that it’s not at all pretentious. The lyrics aren’t emphasised with a thousand expletives (though the occasional one or two are perfectly acceptable...), there’s no overbearing attitude and every emotion that dances on a guitar melody or floats on Jenkins’ voice is believable. It’s refreshing to hear genuine music from a genuine band with no annoying gimmicks. If this doesn’t appeal to the majority of genuine music fans out there, I don’t know what will.
Due to phenomenal demand, the band’s first UK show sold out, proving that they are a big hit on both sides of the pond. Over 10 years after they released their first album, Third Eye Blind are still living up to the mass media attention that they deserve.
Third Eye Blind is made up of Stephan Jenkins, Tony Fredianelli and Ari Ingber.
To find out more about the American rockers, check out their website or Myspace.