First off, let me just say that fun., being (at least formerly) indie in nature, hold themselves to a much higher standard than most of the god-awful bland pop out there on the radio. It helps that singer Nate Ruess actually sounds just like Freddie Mercury, always a great artistic and creative role model to aspire to.
But the problem is, Ruess only sounds like Mercury when he's actually singing - on his own. This becomes particularly problematic on their sophomore album Some Nights, which is very much a Base Breaker because it adopts a more mainstream sound including, yes, the dreaded Auto Tune plague.
Here I bring up the Unwind Rule of Artistic Talent (paraphrased): "If you paint things wrong 'cause that's the best you can do, you're just a chump. You paint that way just 'cause you want to? Then you're an artist." fun. definitely falls under the second category in that they have proven themselves more than capable of producing non-mainstream-sounding music on their own merit. The trouble is, they really had no need to dabble in overproduction the way they did. They sounded just fine without it.
That's not to say that Some Nights is unlistenable. It's not, especially not the title track (despite the fact that it's extremely Narmy). Unfortunately, I have to say this song has suffered from extreme overexposure. It's really the kind of song that's good in small doses every so often, but to tune through various radio stations for an hour each day (even respectable alt-rock radio like the Bay Area's World-Class Rock station, the World-Famous KFOG), and be guaranteed that at some point you're going to hear "Some Nights" or, worse, "We Are Young," it really wears thin after a short while. Honestly, fun. has really become played out to death by now.
But hey, it could be worse. They could be ridiculously overhyped hacks (overhyped fun. is, yes, but talentless they are not) like Carly Rae Jepsen, Ed Sheeran, or Owl City. Or batshit-insane Attention Whores like Adam Levine. Or flavorless and completely devoid of personality like The Lumineers.
P.S. There really needs to be a review type for artists and groups. Calling this a Whole Series Review doesn't really seem right.
Music I'm in two minds here.
First off, let me just say that fun., being (at least formerly) indie in nature, hold themselves to a much higher standard than most of the god-awful bland pop out there on the radio. It helps that singer Nate Ruess actually sounds just like Freddie Mercury, always a great artistic and creative role model to aspire to.
But the problem is, Ruess only sounds like Mercury when he's actually singing - on his own. This becomes particularly problematic on their sophomore album Some Nights, which is very much a Base Breaker because it adopts a more mainstream sound including, yes, the dreaded Auto Tune plague.
Here I bring up the Unwind Rule of Artistic Talent (paraphrased): "If you paint things wrong 'cause that's the best you can do, you're just a chump. You paint that way just 'cause you want to? Then you're an artist." fun. definitely falls under the second category in that they have proven themselves more than capable of producing non-mainstream-sounding music on their own merit. The trouble is, they really had no need to dabble in overproduction the way they did. They sounded just fine without it.
That's not to say that Some Nights is unlistenable. It's not, especially not the title track (despite the fact that it's extremely Narmy). Unfortunately, I have to say this song has suffered from extreme overexposure. It's really the kind of song that's good in small doses every so often, but to tune through various radio stations for an hour each day (even respectable alt-rock radio like the Bay Area's World-Class Rock station, the World-Famous KFOG), and be guaranteed that at some point you're going to hear "Some Nights" or, worse, "We Are Young," it really wears thin after a short while. Honestly, fun. has really become played out to death by now.
But hey, it could be worse. They could be ridiculously overhyped hacks (overhyped fun. is, yes, but talentless they are not) like Carly Rae Jepsen, Ed Sheeran, or Owl City. Or batshit-insane Attention Whores like Adam Levine. Or flavorless and completely devoid of personality like The Lumineers.
P.S. There really needs to be a review type for artists and groups. Calling this a Whole Series Review doesn't really seem right.