Album reviews for The Garden EP, A song-by-song take at the album Options

[Badman]

Go song by song and list what you like and what you don't like about the album. Don't comment if you haven't actually listened to the whole thing and just want to heckle. We can be even-handed and objective rather than emotional about this album.

Onto my review! Much of this is stream of consciousness while listening to the songs.

1) The Garden

Pretty catchy pop music. It feels like it is going somewhere but never arrives. He reuses the line "dirty water" from DWLF which feels like lazy songwriting. It is listenable though and I could see this getting stuck in my head after a few spins.

2) Rise

Normally Ed builds up in his songs... not so with this song. He explodes off the track with this one. The use of the word "rise" reminds me of DWLF as well. This song is clearly about rising up from the attacks on his character that he is fighting in the courts. Overall it doesn't excite me and feels repetitive.

3) I'm The Proof

Now this is the traditional Ed right here. He builds up nicely and I like how the musicians don't play initially but give time for just vocals. The lyrics to this song are the first on the album to really make me think christian lyrics. He is trying to say he is christian now but this song kind of contradicts Rise. Overall at the same level as The garden in terms of a listenable song. The difference is that the closer I listen to this song the less I like it whereas the Garden did nothing to hurt anyone.

4) Solar Flare

Oh... that falsetto at first is bad. Just horrible. D: The chorus reminds me of What are we fighting for. Oh my god, did he really just go na na na na nanana na? Hey, I actually like the little addition he did a minute before the end of the song. Rarely does Ed quite down long enough to let anyone be heard but him. Still, this is the worst song on the album so far. Just... just... ugh.

5) Mind Games

This is a cover of John Lennon and I have never heard the original. First thing, ed is getting into this thing where he kind of fluctuates up and down like "miiiIIIiiiiIIIiiiIIIiiinnd games" It is annoying and reminds me of in Solar Flare how he goes "SAVE me FROM mySELF" . "Love is a flower, you gotta let it grow" is a terrible line; I can't believe lennon wrote it. The rhythm guitar in this song is annoying and if Ed really wanted to nail this song it would have been acoustic with some tambourines,sitars, or something. Ed from 1999 would have clearly seen that. The last 40 seconds of the song are well done though.

6) The Garden (Juno Reactor Remix)

Nice start to this song... quiet. The beat behind the lyrics is much better than the original. It gives the sense of impending doom and makes it a whole new song. The car screeches are cool too. I know why this song is so much better now!! The crappy drummer has been replaced by a backbeat, brilliant!!

I award this song the best song on the album award. I like it more than I like Heaven from BoP. This song and DWLF are where I was hoping the album would go. They missed the mark on this album but maybe in the future Ed will work with this guy again.

7) Rise (Elder Jepson Remix) [Feat Hawkman]

Oh my god, a callout at the beginning of the song. This guy sounds like a retarded Jamaican. Oh dear god it is dubstep, Ed did not just make a dubstep song. I haven't been this embarrassed for Ed since the song Home on SFBM. No friend of mine will hear me listening to this crap. This hawkman guy keeps trying to shove in past Ed but can't seem to. This collaboration doesn't feel natural when listening to the song. It reminds me of when Ed was in that "get like me" rap song. Ed, you are drunk, go home.

8) I'm The Proof (Feat. Eva and the Heartmaker)

After that last song, this sounds like a great start! On this start this doesn't sound much different from the original. Hmm... this girl has a high pitched voice. This reminds me strongly of the stuff done with shelby lynn back in BoP. Same bland drums... overall this music doesn't inspire me. Forgettable is the word that comes to mind. One positive is that this collaboration feels more natural than the hawkman monstrosity.

9) Solar Flare (Jamie Candiloro Remix)

Oh god, please not more dubstep. Oh no, nananananas... So far no dubstep, it sounds kind of foreboding like the Juno Reactor remix. This actually isn't that bad. The drum machine is giving an above average beat. I also think the xylophones in the background add to the song. Overall this remix is better than the original. I think it is the second best song on the album actually. The lyrics are still shit but if you can get past that it works.

10) Mind Games (Karsh Kale Remix)

Cool way to start off. It lacks passion though. The beat doesn't change; it is just a boring song altogether. I had high hopes here after DWLF but they weren't met. This song is forgettable and uninspiring. Right in the middle of the road album-wise. It fails to offend me but it fails to make me want to listen further.

--
Overall I'd say this album only has one to two songs on it that are worth pulling while the rest can be trashed for precious harddrive space. It could have been really good if he would have gone the juno reactor/karsh kale way on all the songs and spent more time with them. Overall the album feels rushed and kind of out of touch with what people listen to these days. Who is his target audience? Soccer moms don't like dubstep and neither do christian conservatives. Ed is very confused and I'm not sure what he is getting at. I give the album a 3.5/10 which places it slightly below SFBM.

This post has been edited by Badman: Nov 22 2012, 3:25 pm

[+AllOverMe+]

i'm not very good at giving reviews.

All i can say is there are some tracks on it i like: I'm The Proof ft. Eva and Rise (if you forget the lyrics).

I think this one is worser than Alive. Ed took the same direction but there are not many catchy songs. All the songs sounds a bit the same.

Sorry Ed, i wanted to be a good fan for you, but i'm really not. I only like 3/10 songs of this EP. This is not my piece of cake. However, i just want to be positive, so i want to thank Ed for the tracks like. I will take a listen to your next solo album.

Anyway, i'm not planning to buy the physical release in December. I really feel bad for what Ed has done to CCP. I'm not supporting this EP.

[Hoodstock]

5) Mind Games

This is a cover of John Lennon and I have never heard the original. First thing, ed is getting into this thing where he kind of fluctuates up and down like "miiiIIIiiiiIIIiiiIIIiiinnd games" It is annoying

That is how the original song is sung. He did a really good job covering it.

I can't believe so many of you have said that you've never heard the song. It was originally written with the Beatles and then tweaked and released as part of a solo album. It was the title track of the Mind Games album and was a top 20 song on the charts.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8dHUfy_YBps

[mattyeagles]

My review:

1. The garden--I like this song..catchy and his voice sounds great...lyrics are ehhh but overall, my favorite on the album

2. rise--song is ok...nice to see a little emotion and passion, but song doesnt do much for me at all

3. im the proof--dont like this song; way too self serving and kind of corny

4. solar flare--i like it, my 2nd favorite behind the garden...

5. mind games--nice cover, nothing special, voice sounds good again

remixes--all fine, i guess...think ed just experimenting with different sounds...none are particularly interesting to me and prob wont listen again

conclusion: when compared to live's music from 91-99 and parts of BOP (she, lighthouse, rivertown, like i do) this EP is very very disappointing, obviously...that being said, EVERYTHING i have ever listened to pares in comparison from live's best work...hence why this is the only message board i am on because i dont want to to miss it if that magic could ever be recreated again...any mystery in ed's lyrics or what the song is about is COMPLETELY gone...i still discover something new every time i listen to MJ, TC, SS, and TDTH and have been listening to those albums consistently since release...i do like this EP more than SFBM and Alive, however, and think there are some elements of the songs that are enjoyable and a little more complex than those cd's

[Pokey]

Ok I'll give this review thing a proper shot.

1). The Garden

We're off to a ripper start here, it only took 5 words into the EP before Ed mentioned the word "water". He's gone to the well a few too many times with this one, excuse the pun. It seems to be the story of how it's very easy in this life to see the world's short comings, it's easier to find dirty water than the pure clear drinking water. It's a masterful analogy, you know, if you're a 9 year old. Ed seems to be painting himself here as the person who can lead you out of life's misery as he sings "take my hand" to open what is a typical Ed chorus these days, the "power" chorus, the inspirational fist in the air kind of stuff; it's meant to sound empowering, and hey maybe it would be if I believed a word of what he was saying. The melody of the chorus is catchy, there is no denying that, but it is so unoriginal that you could probably marry it up to god knows how many pop songs over the years ... replace Ed's voice and it could easily be the chorus to the winning song of the new American Idol. There is nothing unique, nor special about this track. Ed's voice sounds ok, he's in "inspirational rock" mode, which is where he is for most of the EP. But his voice just doesn't sound natural for some reason, I dare say there's a bit of auto tune going on here.

1/10.

2). Rise

This one is a stomper from the get go! It attacks your senses with a sense of urgency and energy, very produced, not a very natural sounding song, but Ed is busting out a strong message here - he is innocent, he has done nothing wrong, people are coming to attack him but he will be strong (hey I made a rhyme like Ed!). The problem is, every single word of what he says is BS. So this song is basically just a lie to music. This fact alone puts this song somewhere near the absolute bottom of songs he's done, which is saying something. I notice he didn't have the balls to add the word "motherfuckin'" at the end like he did in the live version .. probably because it would have slapped a big language warning on his EP which wouldn't be good for sales for the good Christian folk. "Fall out of the sky, like a shooting star burning in the night", that right there is an example of how Ed's lyrics have just gone to hell; a very unoriginal and boring simile. It is just incredibly lazy song writing. The utterance of the words "I did nothing wrong" is absolutely laughable. This song MIGHT have at least sonically sounded ok if it was a pure and natural "organic" rock song ... imagine this rocking with the sound of a TC or SS era song; instead it sounds so produced and digitalised that it just sounds atrocious. Basically, the song itself is bad enough to warrant a 1/10, but since you factor into the story it's trying to push:

-5/10

3). I'm the proof

80's inspirational power ballad incoming! Eddie K is trying to tell us that all the hardships we have been through in life, he has been there too! I like it when multi-millionaires try to identify with me and my student budget and how eating anything other than 2 minute noodles is a bit of a treat. Cheers Ed, good to know we're in the same boat! This is another fist in the air type song, Ed is telling us that it's ok to change and be different to what you were before. And really, that's true, it IS ok to change and be different, if this is the sort of music Ed wants to make now and it's who he is, that is totally fine, what isn't fine is all the shit he's done along the way while changing. The "sometimes people change, and I'm the proof" line doesn't seem to gel well with the rest of the song ... he was just saying how he is just like all of us, but now he's saying he's changed? Maybe that's true, he was just like all of us, but now he's a money hungry greedy fuckwit. This song might actually be an honest account about how Ed is different to what many of us fell in love with him for. He used to be just like us, he used to be in our position, but now he's changed and life is so much better. At least that's how I choose to interpret the song. The music to this is just extremely dull.

0/10

4). Solar Flare

Starting off with a bit of "oooooo'ing", more of Ed thinking he's a master vocalist. I wouldn't be surprised if the drums on this track were done in garage band, they don't sound real at all. "Nah nah nah nah nah yeeeeeah" is a very poetic and amazingly deep statement he's making, he's saying both "nah" and "yeah" which are direct contradictions of one another, he's really getting in touch with his Secret Samadhi era writing here by being very ambiguous and mysterious. Sarcasm might be the cheapest form of humour, so consider my humour as empty as Ed's creative well. This song is just utterly boring. There is nothing that will make this song stand out and in 5 years time it will be utterly forgotten. That's the problem with Ed's music now, so many songs are just utterly forgettable ... who remembers Rome? Or You Are Not Alone? This track is the "filler" track of this EP, which again is saying something.

-1/10

5). Mind Games

To be fair, this was the one I actually had some hope for. Ed has never been involved with a bad cover, either in Live or solo. He does covers really well, even of artists I don't really like such as U2 and Lennon himself; but the covers of Imagine and Running to stand still were brilliant. He often made the covers better than the originals - Supernatural, Love my way and Walk the line. So I had some hopes that this song would be the Zion of this EP for me, the one that I could go "hey that's not so bad!"
Unfortunately it's a giant pile of shit. The song just does not have any kind of flow whatsoever, it sounds very disjointed and jarring. In fact you couldn't even tell it's a cover, it sounds exactly the same as every other song on this EP. And that's a huge problem with this EP, it all sounds exactly the same, it's all been so produced that it has squeezed any little bit of natural sound out of these songs so that they all sound identical.
Like Dancing Queen said, I wouldn't be surprised if every single instrument on this song was done digitally in garage band on his mac while sitting on the toilet. Ed would have been MUCH better of making this song an acoustic one on the album ... what's wrong with having songs sound like a band is set up and just playing them naturally? It's just SO produced.
Normally I'd give it a 0/10, but for getting my hopes up:

-2/10

6). The Garden Remix

Right here we go! Starting off with some bad ass gangsta vibes ... shades on, slow motion ride cruising through Compton with the Uzi in hand, gang colours on ... and then you basically find out it's the original song in a time shift with this try hard shit pasted over the top of it. It gave me a bit of a giggle though!

0/10

7). Rise Remix

"OH! Ed Kowalczyk" ... did he just have himself name checked on his own EP? This is possibly the lowest point (musically speaking) in which Ed has ever found himself. Good god that opening is hilarious! It's again like putting terrible cheap garage band dubstep over the top of the original song because thats what "the kids" like these days, so maybe it'll make him some money! It's like dubstep for the Christian kids. You know how Christian rock is like watered down version of what good rock could be but they pass it off like "but we rock just as hard cos we're cool and we got Jesus on our side!" , this is like that, but with dubstep.
I'll use a little anecdote from my childhood - when I was young I had this friend who's parents were really strict; one of the things they used to do was not allow them to have any soft drinks, instead they would give them EXTREMELY watered down cola flavoured cordial and call it "coca cola" ... his younger brothers had no idea so they went around proudly exclaiming that they were drinking coca cola! Sorry kids, but you were just fed a lie and now you're walking around thinking what you got is amazing. This is like Ed with his rock and now dubstep it seems, he is feeding the sheep this stuff and they are all walking around thinking they're listening to some really great rock, when in fact it is watered down cordial.
This remix is just so bad, just so, so bad. Hawkman couldn't even save it and I usually don't mind him actually, only heard of him from the Evolution Revolution Love song that Tricky did with Ed, so followed him a bit, but nope; it proves Ed has the midas touch, you know, just replacing gold with shit. I'm only giving it 1 point more than the original because it at least made me laugh.

-4/10

8). I'm the proof feat. Eva Heartmaker

Well this is just like the original but with some girl called Eva singing bits of it, she hasn't got an amazing voice, it's also been auto tuned like Ed, only hers is a lot more noticable with extremely little range displayed. The only saving grace here is that you can kind of tell she is probably hot from that voice, so a google image search confirms this. Otherwise, nothing really to add here.

1/10

9). Solar Flare Remix

Sounds like he basically got the same remix as was used from The Garden, added a bit more distortion and reused it here over the top of the original songs. Even the remixing is lazy. Fuck this is shit. "Nah nah nah nah nah nah nah" you said it Ed, you said it!

-2/10

10). Mind Games Remix

Here we are with the one trick pony Karsh Kale, the start is OKish, I have a bit of love for Indian music, but the thing is I like GOOD Indian music, this is just shit and it's been looped over and over and over and over the top of the original song's vocal track. LAZY. What the fuck am I even listening to here? Is this the man that made Pillar of Davidson??

-3/10

Conclusion

The Garden EP is one of the worst pieces of music I have heard this year by ANY artist. It is incredibly lazy song writing and even lazily put together. It was just so over produced that it sucks any kind of natural or organic nature the songs could have had right out. This is a new low for Ed, honestly, this is the worst thing he has ever done, worse then Alive, worse then SFBM.

-14/100

[World Dreamer]

You, Pokey, win the day.

[Merica]

Good post, Pokey.

[FishOutaWater]

Pokey, if there was a way for me to get around the fact that I must spread my rep points around more, I would rep the hell out of you for that one. Truly superior post.

[OutToDry]

Stellar post Pokey. I will refrain from giving a review because I don't think you all want to know what I think of it.

[Pokey]

Pokey, if there was a way for me to get around the fact that I must spread my rep points around more, I would rep the hell out of you for that one. Truly superior post.

I usually dig up old threads and rep people who no longer post here until I can rep the person I actually want to rep ... not that I'm condoning that sort of behavior though!

Stellar post Pokey. I will refrain from giving a review because I don't think you all want to know what I think of it.

To be fair, I think my "Chimp review" actually summed up all of what I had to say here much better!
You could give us a review though OTD!

[Badman]

The only saving grace here is that you can kind of tell she is probably hot from that voice, so a google image search confirms this. Otherwise, nothing really to add here.

This made me lol You gave him points for it too.

[SJN1279]

Pokey, if there was a way for me to get around the fact that I must spread my rep points around more, I would rep the hell out of you for that one. Truly superior post.

Fish likes long overlong posts......

[themaestro]

Fish likes long overlong posts......

And you obviously don't like posts by fish.

[OutToDry]

I usually dig up old threads and rep people who no longer post here until I can rep the person I actually want to rep ... not that I'm condoning that sort of behavior though!





To be fair, I think my "Chimp review" actually summed up all of what I had to say here much better!
You could give us a review though OTD!

I need to sit and listen through it again and make notes.

[Pokey]

Fish likes long overlong posts......

Well that is a terribly constructed sentence, Mr Educator. a "long overlong" huh?

Why don't we get a review from you Nick, tell us how and why this is among Ed's best work ever and how it racks up against TC and SS and such, we could all use a good laugh!