Saliva - Blood Stained Love Story Review
Posted by Brandon Ratliff on 01.23.2007
Excuse me, who ordered the Saliva?
Saliva - Blood Stained Loved Story
Release Date: January 23, 2007
Label: Island Records
Produced By: Bob Marlette
First Single: Ladies And Gentlemen
Recommended Downloads: Broken Sunday, Never Gonna Change, Black Sheep
Saliva is:
Vocals: Josey Scott
Guitar: Wayne Swinney
Bass: Dave Novotny
Drums: Paul Crosby
Tracklisting
1. Ladies And Gentlemen
2. Broken Sunday
3. Never Gonna Change
4. King Of The Stereo
5. One More Chance
6. Going Under
7. Twister
8. Black Sheep
9. Starting Over
10. Here With You
Unlike many bands that are around nowadays, Saliva is one of those bands that you more or less know what you're going to get when they release a new album. Forming in Memphis in 1996 and hitting it big with their Island Records debut Every Six Seconds in 2001, the band has pretty much stuck to their guns through the course of four albums. 2002 brought Back Into Your System with its hit huge crossover hit "Always," which saw the band taking a slightly softer edge to their music that Realplayer describes as "perfect for shopping, cruising, or partying." After two hugely successful tours, the band released Survival Of The Sickest on August 17, 2004. It didn't create quite as much of a stir as the two albums before it, but the title track did pretty well on rock radio, as did its follow-up single "Razor's Edge" (which featured 3 Doors Down vocalist Brad Arnold).
In the two and a half years since Survival Of The Sickest, Saliva has incurred many changes. Founding guitarist Chris Dabaldo departed the band after escalating tensions occurred in 2005, dropping the band down to a four piece. They have since replaced him, but the album was recorded with just the four remaining members. Scott also starred in a television series called "Wanted" in the band's downtime. But has the extra time off (as the band took no more than a year and a half between efforts before) and the shake up in the ranks done anything to change Saliva's sound?
Just like with the three albums before this, Saliva really hasn't changed all that much. Most of the tracks are pretty one sided, either sticking with their loud, crunchy party rock sound; or following along the lines of "Rest In Pieces" from Back Into Your System or "Razor's Edge" from Survival Of The Sickest. There is a little bit of variance, such at the razor edged (no pun intended) Black Sheep, which probably ranks as the heaviest song the band has ever done. Don't let that fool you however, as the song definitely carries a lot of that southern rock swagger that Saliva is very well known for, especially with the NASCAR paced riffing and guitar solo. Vocally, Scott sticks to his guns as well, though he does sing about a lot more than the tired "Oh, being a rock star is SOOOOO awesome/difficult!" themes of past fare. "Starting Over" is a trip into the fairly cliche in this category as well, with Scott crooning about realizing he has problems, and wanting to correct them and start over, presumably with a past significant other. Yeah, the lyrics are pretty typical, but to Scott's credit, he sounds much more sincere this time around than he tended to in the past. Speaking of the lyrics, there seems to be a loose theme running throughout the album as well, which the title suggests, though it doesn't scream out at you like a lot of albums with flowing stories do.
As I mentioned before, after Dabaldo left, this album was recorded as a four piece, which meant Swinney and Scott handled all of the guitar work. Now, Scott is very proficient on an acoustic, and Swinney has the technical chops, but fans may notice something missing on the riffing. Dabalado seemed to have just finally hit his stride with Survival Of The Sickest, and his absence is noticed. It's not overly apparent, because face it, most people (generally speaking of course) don't listen to Saliva to critique the music. They listen to it simply on the merit of the fact that Saliva is a rock band that has fun, and that shows in the music. Conversely however, the band definitely churned out some well written, hooky, rock riffs. Emphasis on the "rock" in that statement. Take "Rock And Roll Revolution" for example; that song probably had one of the most memorable main riffs in modern rock. The whole album was full of them.
But that brings us to now. Save for the aforementioned "Black Sheep," the riffing on this album is a little bit substandard for the most part. There's a couple of points where the band sounds at their musical peak though, such as the very "Click Click Boom"-esque "King Of The Stereo" (the song even makes use of that line in one of the verses). "One More Chance" has a nice guitar line in the verse as well, even if it does sound a little too much like something Hoobastank has done before. Otherwise though, basically everything else seems to be filler music. Swinney can write and play some blazing fast guitar solos, but apparently not much more. There's nothing in particular that is downright awful or offensive, but most of it simply doesn't grade any higher than passable. Paul Crosby does an excellent job on the kit yet again however, so as always he's definitely a highlight of the actual music.
Is the album better or worse than any of their past stuff? Lyrically, save for a couple of songs, Scott has stepped up quite a bit. The running theme of the album was no accident, and kudos to Scott for pulling it off, and not making it one of those "Hey! Look! There's a story and it's totally neato!" kind of albums. Look at the title of the album and the tracklist, and then listen to the lyrics (and consider that the original title was Rise And Fall Of A Tragic Kingdom), and you'll see it there.
The music is another story altogether. I've mentioned my qualms with the riffing on the album, as Dabaldo's departure knocked the band two steps back (again, no pun intended) in this category. Swinney keeps up with the racing guitar solos that were very prevalent on Survival Of The Sickest (though thankfully it's not every single song this time around), but comes up a little short otherwise. What is there is passable, but it does little more than turn into background noise in most of the songs. "King Of The Stereo" and "Black Sheep" are very good musically though, so hopefully when it comes to album number six, the band can build off of that style a little more.
So to answer the posed question as a whole, it is neither better or worse really. It's just about on par with their previous works. Hopefully the band can pick up the musical slack on their next album as Josey Scott did lyrically this time around. For now though, Blood Stained Love Story should be enough to whet the appetite of those people that just want to hear some good, hard rock music with a southern edge. Nothing is overly terrible or offensive on the album, so as long as you are okay with the slight set back in the guitar riffing, you shouldn't have a problem enjoying this album.
Or, at the very least, it'd be a good CD to throw on at a party.
The 411: Blood Stained Love Story is about on par with Saliva's past efforts, as the band really never does a whole lot to change their tried-and-true formula. Chris Dabaldo's absence is felt in the slightly generic guitar riffing on most of the album, but Swinney does a decent enough job on his own. His leads are still solid and not quite as overdone as on Survival Of The Sickest, but otherwise the music, save for Crosby's excellent drumming rarely rises above a passable level. Josey Scott picked up a lot of lyrical slack this time around though, and the theme running through the album is just well balanced enough to not be overbearing, but still fairly apparent. The album overall isn't anything new for Saliva, but did you really expect that? Fans will be pleased enough, and as I've said before, that's all you can ask for at the very least. Still, it's an enjoyable listen, so it could have been a lot worse right?
