Too Much Joy Re-Release A Classic
A new single release from Too Much Joy recently dropped, and it definitely encompasses this sort of pop-rock brightness that comes along with an almost theatrical and animated set of vocals that really immerse you and start bringing an added color to the track itself.
The song is called "My Past Lives", and it goes through all the past lives that maybe were, could have been, and does so with such a robust and fun approach that it makes the song almost cheeky.
I love a song like this because it brings such looseness to the table. Not in a sense that the band is loose because the band is great. It comes through with a big rock feel, widespread chords, classic rock and indie rock-infused soundscapes, and an amazing energy.
What I mean by looseness is that the song comes through in a Whimsical sense. It doesn't take itself all too seriously, and with a track like this, it makes perfect sense.
This is a rock banger, and although it has this sort of vast undertone to it, it certainly comes through rocking hard. There's some great guitar work and catchy hooks, which, to me, is important because hooks are meant to be performed by the guitar when it comes to great rock songs.
The track brings together these super fun, crew vocal choruses with a more ambient style guitar hook, and those two things work amazingly together because they balance the song out very well.
This was definitely a fun track, and it's danceable, comes through with a spirited and vibrant performance, which is one of my favorite aspects about it, and it has a great arrangement to it that sort of pulls you in.
The music video that comes with the track is also great because it showcases some live performance stuff, and along with that, there are loads of amazing edits that follow the lyrics perfectly.
Someone definitely took their time editing this video so that it worked out with the flow of the track, following lyric by lyric in a literal sense.
The whole thing comes through a little bit rambunctiously vocally. I really like this. Again, during the verses, the singing is sort of animated and a little wild. It's whimsical, high impact, theatrical, and right in your face.
This lets you pay attention to everything that's being said, and then when the course has come in, there are these almost punk rock style crew vocals that chant altogether, and it makes the song fun because it infuses that punk with Indie and alternative rock, along with a little bit of progressive undertones, and the energy that captures a live performance spirit.
There's such a wonderfully classic and almost vintage rock aesthetic to this track, and it wasn't until I read more of the band's history that I realized that is the era that these guys actually come from.
The band has quite a history throughout the 80s and early 90s, with songs that were praised in the New York Times, and they even shot a video with LL Cool J for their cover of "That's A Lie".
Now, the reason this track and the soundscape as a whole has this amazing vintage rock aesthetic is because it's actually a re-release from their album Son of Sam I Am, originally dropped in the late 80s.
This is outstanding, and I love bands that reissue releases of their records because it just goes to show you how timeless certain tracks can be.
Like fashion, music also goes in circles. It comes back around, and the genre becomes more popular. Right now, for example, there's a lot of 80s-style rock and even electronic songs that are back in style, and I'm happy to see a band actually release a record that was genuinely made in that time.
It did well then, and it feels like it's going to do well now.
This is the first single from that re-release, and the album itself is set to drop once again on Halloween of this year.
The original record was released via Warner Bros. and was their debut album in 1989.
I cannot wait to hear the rest of this record.
Dive into this track right now, and you can really feel that amazing, heavy, and classic rock aesthetic work perfectly for these guys, as the sign of the times is flooding through every second of this single.
Check this one out and look out for the full record, which will now be named Son of Sam I Am (Tommy's Version), except for Halloween.
