The Break & Repair Method – Milk the Bee Album Review
There are very few albums these days that feel like they were made out of love. Most are just the end of an equation, thought up by some A&R guy or record exec, desperately trying to keep himself in his job for an extra week. All they want is an album that will appeal to kids trying to make the next scene; a band fronted by talentless morons; a money machine. Luckily for everyone, Paul made his own equation and the end result was a well crafted, and beautifully written, self produced debut.
Taking its name from the process of trying to obtain a record deal, Milk The Bee is a great set of songs and a singer/songwriters album if ever you heard one.
Heavy on acoustic guitar and piano, there’s a great mix Americana, country, folk and indie. Starting with This City is Bound (To Do Us In), a song about the drudgery of today’s reality talent(less) shows and a country at war, the album always has a point. But believe me when I tell you, if you’re going through a break up or getting a divorce, you’ll want to hear this album! In fact everything you need to know about this record is summed up in You Won’t Be Able To Be Sad. Emotional and sad but incredibly crafted and mixing all the aforementioned styles, it is – for me at least – the stand out song of the record and can stand shoulder to shoulder with any Matchbox Twenty song.
From This City is Bound through Now We Become Part of It to Your Days Are Numbered, to the melancholic closer The Most Someone Can Now, the album hits all the right marks; sometimes not breaking a sweat and just ticking along; and sometimes bringing out it a rockier edge like I’m At A Low.
There are not really any big intro’s and very few big moments to speak of; it simply gets where it’s going, quietly and confidently. But it’s those elements that make it so great – it’s an album that’s not trying to impress you; it knows what it is and knows how to play on your stereo.
And although musically, melodically and lyrically keeps to the same style and theme and is – at least at the beginning – a little hard to distinguish between songs, it has something that the Matchbox records and side projects sometimes lacked – a real sense of an organic recording and writing process. There’s no uber production, there’s no reliance on programming, there’s just a sense of a record that came together over time. You can hear music being played, being made and being enjoyed. Milk The Bee sounds like it’s been made as its gone along, that there’s been no preconceived ideas, just a sense that things have been tried out until they feel comfortable and right.
This isn’t to say that it’s absent on the other records the guys have produced, it isn’t by any means (just read the other album reviews), it’s just that those records come from well oiled machines, that are practiced and trained at knowing what they want and executing it efficiently. The closest they got to that level of ‘suck it and see’ music making was Exile on Mainstream.
So, if you like Exile and are looking for an album you can put on and play, an album that will speak to you and that will hook you in with its gentle and flowing melodies, then Milk The Bee is for you.
It is also a great reminder of the multitude of talents that make up Matchbox. So much is made of Robs song writing, and rightly so, but underestimate your Pauls writing skills at your own risk. He is a fantastic songwriter and a great melody maker. So good, that Paul won the 2009, BMI Songwriter of the Year Award.
Check out The Break & Repair Methods MySpace Page: http://www.myspace.com/thebreakandrepairmethod
You Won’t Be Able To Be Sad – Official Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2fjqwqaqCdM
You Won’t Be Able To Be Sad – Live Acoustic Version: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HSSrB5MU7W8