COPELAND “Eat, Sleep, Repeat”
I’m willing to admit that when I read news of a new COPELAND full-length just a little over a year since their last record, I was a bit skeptical. While In Motion was leaps and bounds more artistically creative than their debut Beneath Medicine Tree, I wasn’t sure if a year was enough time for the band to recover and write something new and different. Thus, I was not expecting much from Eat, Sleep, Repeat, the band’s third full-length to date. However, after a few listens it became apparent that COPELAND, like AS TALL AS LIONS earlier this year, were able to conjure up something rather brilliant in the realm of suupppper melodic and lush rock. Fans of COPELAND’s past sing-a-long masterworks like “Walking Downtown” and “No One Really Wins” may be a bit turned off by Eat, Sleep, Repeat. While there are surely some hooks throughout the album’s duration, they are quite rare. At the center of this album is the rhythm section. While guitar distortions and programmed beats/effects do have an important role, the band’s bassist’s fingerprints are all over the place. From the hip-shaking verse of “Careful Now” to the brooding title track to the glorious closer “When You Thought You’d Never Stand Out,” the basslines, along with plenty of solid drum rhythms, run wild. Aside from the misty nature of several of the more straightforward songs on the album, COPELAND experiments with new sounds and programming effects in tracks such as the opener “Where’s My Head,” the simple, vocal-driven “I’m Safer On An Airplane,” and the “sounds as if though it’s playing backwards” track titled “The Last Time He Saw Dorie.” While the experimentation is welcome addition to a band that could so easily write the same songs over and over, the traditional-sounding COPELAND songs are the most memorable. “Control Freak,” “Cover What You Can,” and “I’m A Sucker For A Kind Word” are all lasting examples along with the incredible “Love Affair” which sees the addition of strings and horns, making for a conclusion unlike anything COPELAND has done in the past. Aaron Marsh, COPELAND’s songwriter and vocalist, is at his best on Eat, Sleep, Repeat. His chill, relaxing vocals take over several songs, giving the entire album a mixture of meaning and substance. It’s chilling to think of how far his vocals, along with the rest of his bandmates, have come since writing the catchy pop staple “Walking Downtown” almost four years ago. With their singing to Columbia Records shortly after the release of this disc, COPELAND has a chance at making quite the impact on a broader audience, and with the evolution showcased on Eat, Sleep, Repeat, I’d say that, without dissecting the signing too much, COPELAND definitely has a chance at doing just that.
The Militia Group
