Underclass Hero

It was with great anticipation for new material from the band that I purchased this album on its day of release. Being a fan of Sum 41 suggests in itself that I was interested to hear how the remaining three members had coped with the departure of Dave Brownsound. Now It has been half a year and I have listened to this collection of songs on several occasions in order to discover just how I feel towards it. Its hard for me to have a clear opinion on "Underlcass Hero" because of many factors. As individual songs each is great in its own respect, however, in each of those songs Sum 41 has kept the same rhythm pattern in terms of the notes used, the same rhythm that is present in many songs, for example, Blink-182's "Dammit" or even Sum 41's own "The Hell Song". With this affecting factor it gives an overall tiresome feel to the whole album, and a sense of feeling that you have listened to each song before, which of course is simply down to the fact that you have just heard the same rhythm in the previous song on the record. It is with this knowledge that I would recommend buying this cd to listen to the songs individually in a shuffle rather than continuously as is in the record format. Lyrically, the songs are extremely well written, showing signs of very personal aspects of lead singer/guitarist Deryck Whibley's life, and perhaps that is the reason the accompanying music lacks originality, because more time was spent on the words than the canvas of music.

The album opens with the first single track "Underlcass Hero". This song is lively and upbeat, put has extreme similarities with songs on the bands second album "All Killer No Filler". This sort of similarity to the Sum 41 of a few years back is evident on several other tracks on the record too. Highlights of the album, for me, are the songs "Speak Of The Devil", "Count Your Last Blessings", "Ma Poubelle" (A short song sung in French), "The Jester" and "So Long Goodbye". The reason I have highlighted these songs out of the collection is simply the fact that they do not have the above mentioned pattern so often in the songs and give something different to the album, "So Long Goodbye" being specifically the best song of the record with its acoustic guitars and subject matter of Brownsound's departure. Through that fact, though, the metal style guitars and skilful solos lack on "Underclass Hero", and that perhaps is the one area of the band that seems to bring this album down to a lower standard than "Does This Look Infected?" and "Chuck", the latter of which being my favourite and most recommended of Sum 41's albums. As well as the old fast-punk style of the band, there are also slower type parts to these songs in areas, specifically the songs "With Me" and "Best Of Me", both reminiscent, to me, of Yellowcard. However, the two songs are basically the same, and did not both need to be recorded in my opinion, and both follow very similar pattern, and both include the before mentioned pattern that I previously spoke about.

Overall, I do like this album, despite the negative aspects I have mentioned, I just would recommend, as I said before, listening to each song individually. I think this is like a new start for the trio, and I am looking forward to any material made in the future. My rating for this album would be lyrically 9/10, but in terms of the music written 5/10, so an overall rating of about 7/10, therefore well worth buying.

underclass hero brings back the things that made sum 41 so popular from all killer no filler,
but without losing the maturity they have progressed to.

the album contains powerful lyrics, and some music that is evidently well put together on first listen.
for those who enjoyed the jokey side of sum 41, but also the more hardcore, more mature side -
this album won't disappoint.

What do you do if your label is about to drop you? Answer, produce an album as good as Underclass Hero. It's an album of great variety which means it won't please those who just like pop punk.

What Underclass Hero is, is a great album with surprising depth, that you can return to again and again. Whatever mood you're in there's something here for you.