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The Used Album: “Lies for the Liars [f.y.e. Exclusive]”
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Lies for the Liars [f.y.e. Exclusive] |
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Release Date:2007-05-22
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Type:Unknown
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Genre:Rock, Emo, Old School Punk Rock
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Label:Reprise
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Explicit Lyrics:Yes
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UPC:093624995401
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Review - :
It isn't completely fair to compare {$the Used} to {$My Chemical Romance}, despite their associations in the past (they covered {$Queen} and {$David Bowie}'s {&"Under Pressure"} as a team) and surface similarities. {$The Used} have deeper roots in {\punk} (there's a reason why former drummer {$Branden Steineckert} high-tailed it for a gig with {$Rancid}), and they always were more purely {\emo} than {$MCR}. Nevertheless, {$the Used}'s third studio album, {^Lies for the Liars}, sure brings to mind {^The Black Parade}, particularly in how {$the Used} pile on lurid, florid {\art rock} trappings upon their {\pop}-{\punk}, borrowing vocal arrangements from {$Queen} and imagery from {^The Wall} (this time, it's the worms); the album also has a song called {&"Hospital"} that recalls the deathbed escapades of {%Gerard Way}. But where {^Lies for the Liars} really shares similarities with {^The Black Parade} is in how it's a big-budget escalation of the band's sound designed to leave the {\emo} tag behind. While there's a haze of pretension hanging over some of the record -- nowhere more so than on the awful single {&"The Bird and the Worm,"} a noisy hookless cluster of staccato strings, druid vocals, and narcissistic {\emo} romanticism -- this plays more poppy than proggy, as {$the Used} dabble in all sorts of classic {\pop} sounds, kicking off the album with a sleek, echoey {\new wave} guitar and then spiking the chorus of {&"With Me Tonight"} with blaring horns straight out of {$Chicago}. All this flair gives {^Lies for the Liars} some lightness if not levity, since {$the Used} is, like all bands of their ilk, a very serious band, diligently plundering the deep uncharted avenues of the soul. Try as they may to inject some humor into their music -- the mock-shuffle on {&"Paralyzed,"} the two-step gallop of {&"With Me Tonight,"} the "liar, liar pants on fire" chorus of {&"Liar Liar (Burn in Hell),"} which was probably meant ironically but sure doesn't play that way -- this is a relentlessly sober affair, churning with glum guitars and an eternally adolescent sincerity. It's not funny, it's not fun, but it wasn't meant to be: it was meant as a collection of tortured love songs ({&"Earthquake"} and {&"Find a Way"} boasting the sweetest melody and harmonies here) and teenage solidarity anthems ({&"Pretty Handsome Awkward,"} which winds up sounding like a clumsy come-on). Ironically enough, that splashy production and infusion of {\pop} on {^Lies for the Liars} may very well keep away the adolescents who stuck with the band throughout their first two records -- there's nothing that angsty teenagers like better than aggression, which isn't necessarily absent here, but it is tempered -- and may keep them from speaking to any listener a few years removed from college. [An fye Exclusive edition was also released.] ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Music Guide
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![The Used Album: “Lies for the Liars [f.y.e. Exclusive]”](http://www.poprockbands.com/covers_yaU/the-used/2007_170_170_Lies%2520for%2520the%2520Liars%2520%255Bf.y.e.%2520Exclusive%255D.jpg "The Used Album: “Lies for the Liars [f.y.e. Exclusive]”")
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