Yellowcard's Southern Air Review

Yellowcard

Yellowcard emerged in the early 2000s and quickly became well known for their quick tempos and violin incorporation. Their first album with Capitol Records, Ocean Avenue, released in 2003, was amazing in terms of technicality. With songs like “Only One,” “Empty Apartment,” and “Way Away,” listeners were introduced to something they had never heard before. Violinist Sean Mackin added more depth and emotion to the songs and complimented Ryan Key’s vocals. The band played on the Vans Warped Tour and toured with Matchbook Romance (Billboard). Since then they have released a few albums, Lights and Sounds in 2006, Paper Walls in 2007, When You’re Through Thinking, Say Yes in 2011, and now Southern Air (Yellowcard).

The first song on the Southern Air album sounds like classic Yellowcard. “Awakening” starts off slow but gradually picks up. The quick tempo and catchy chorus allows the song to have mass appeal. There seems to only be a subtle violin at first but towards the end, it becomes more noticeable and contributes much emotion to the song. The title track, “Southern Air” is not the best song off the album but it is decent. The lyrics of the song are well written but almost hard to distinguish from everything else going on in the song. It almost seems too crowded as if they tried to incorporate too much. A song like this would be better if it were more simplistic.

The only slow song on the album is entitled “Ten.” It seems to be about the author’s loss of a child ten years ago. Throughout the song, he reminisces about his relationship and what would have been now if the child hadn’t passed. It’s a very heartfelt song even if listeners might not be able to relate to it. It’s a truly beautiful song. The bonus track on the album is a cover of Coldplay’s “Fix You.” The band did a fantastic job with their rendition of the song.

Overall, the album is good but some of the songs sound too similar. They should have included more slow songs like on their Ocean Avenue album. A lot has changed since 2003 so what worked then, might not necessarily work now. It’ll be interesting to see how the band progresses and develops from here and to see if their target market changes at all.