Album Review: Sleeping With Sirens - Feel

Feel, the second album from Sleeping With Sirens, raises several questions... Who gave the boy band instruments and told them they knew how to rock? And most puzzlingly, why am I listening to this?

Vocalist Kellin Quin is what makes Sleeping With Sirens stand out (a little) from the crowd of over-polished, safe and sanitised rock. It almost sounds like Justin Bieber has a side project fronting a nouveau metal band, and the pre-pubescent sounding vocals take away any edge Feel was at risk of having. I'm sure his aggression is genuine, but with such a young voice it almost sounds like an overindulged child looking for something to rebel against before their bedtime.

Musically, it's an impressive effort. The instrumentation is tight, precise and even almost rocks at times. The Best There Ever Was is the biggest stand-out as deserving genuine praise. But the bad more than outweighs the good. Second last track Sorry attempts anthem status. Piano-filled verses of contemplation before the soaring guitars and vocals of the chorus tick every cliché they can think of. Album closer Satellites also aims for something grand, but fizzles and fades out mid-chorus, making it a good representation of the album as a whole.

The hubris is almost overwhelming, and nowhere more so than the faux answering machine message to the song's collaborator in the intro to Congratulations, when someone (assumedly Quin) over sincerely says, “Kids definitely are not ready for this shit/So give me a call back, let's change the world”. Hopefully he's right, because if kids are ready for this shit, the world is in some real trouble.