Completely agree with you; one of the things I most like about Butch is that he can go down a variety of paths without dipping in quality. I enjoy his M3 stuff as much as Stay Gold or Letters. I even dig the mellow and low-key Afraid of Ghosts; you just can't measure it with the same yardstick as the other material.

In fact, at the risk of being booted from the board, I'll take his solo work on The Spade, Stay Gold, Left Of, or Rise & Fall over the latest M3 record. I liked it more in spirit/vibe than the actual songs; there were only three solid tracks for me - Kill a Motherfucker, She Sheila, and If We're On Fire (okay, fine, we can squeeze in Growing All My Hair Out).

Part of the issue for me is that our melodic rock sound can be as confining as it is exciting; it traps artists in well-worn cliches and the diminishing returns of a sonic been-there, done that. Like many of you, I enjoy Butch more when he rocks out in some way, but that can take on many expansive shapes and identities and that versatiliy is what I find most interesting about him.

One of the interesting thing about artistry is that fans often don't really know what they want (or don't want what they think they want, which is "more of the same, please"). U2 releases a monster like The Joshua Tree and you want them to stay on that treadmill forever, but then they reinvent themselves with Achtung Baby like only they could and that freshness transforms what you like about them. Etc.

That said, there are Butch solo albums I didn't especially enjoy - "Butch Walker as...Glenn" did nothing for me and the concept album "American Love Story" had a few okay spots but was largely a miss. So it goes with experimentation and taking swings, but the guy will never go stale unlike some bands I could mention!



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/07/2024 03:03AM by JMac.