Here's a review for an album I am really late to the party with. Hope This Ends Well by Feeble was released back in June of 2018 but I only discovered it on Bandcamp this month. Feeble are a four piece kind of pop punk band from Honolulu, Hawaii, who have been putting out music regularly since January 2017. Normally I have a rule about reviewing albums that came out so long ago but I enjoyed Hope This Ends Well so much I just have to! Plus it's an opportunity to feature a band from Hawaii, we've never done that on CPRW before.
Hope This Ends Well begins with the song Jules. Starting out with some jangly indie punk guitars, it quickly feels upbeat and even chirpy. Quite a surprising way for the album to start considering it was described as being by four "kinda bummed dudes". It is a positive and upbeat song where lead singer Brent Vida encourages his girl to cheer up and hang out with her friends. The chorus is quite the highlight and I imagine it's a lot of fun to sing back at the band in a live scenario. This is followed by the track Peeling Scabs. It starts with a fairly lengthy intro which sounds a bit distorted. This adds to the overall raw feel of the album and I really dig it. When the vocals do come in there's a real sense of urgency and Feeble immediately have your attention. Vocally this song is so intense, particularly as the song builds it becomes more of a scream than actual singing. It's about coming to the end of a relationship or friendship and realising that there's nothing worth holding on to. The third song on the album is called Jobs. Jobs is one of the real stand out tracks on the album, tackling the subject of being stuck in a job you dislike and realising that you're wasting your life away. This is quite a bleak subject but musically Feeble sound as if they're having a bit of a celebration. Perhaps the song is quite cathartic for them, like I imagine it would be to a lot of the listeners. Much like Peeling Scabs before it, there's a reasonably length intro before the party really gets started. This seems to be a technique that Feeble like to use.
On Labon it seems as if Feeble are at their lowest. Gone is the cathartic upbeat nature from earlier in the album, there's a real feeling of glumness throughout the song. Even at the highest points of the song, it just feels really sad. The lyric "make me better, as if I mattered at all" is the one that really stands out and it just breaks you. The fifth track, Ms Mullins, She's The Man, is the song that first caught my attention when I discovered Feeble. On this one Feeble spend no time on the introduction and Vida launches himself into the opening lyrics of "I wanna bring you flowers when you're not okay". From then on I found myself completely hooked on the song and quickly found myself wanting to sing-along. Luckily the song is written in such a way it doesn't take much time at all to pick the song up with its simple structure and catchy lyrics. Reverting back to the sad song/upbeat sound formula, it's another song that is brilliantly cathartic. It tells the story of rejection from someone you have some strong feelings for – we've all been there. I loved the clash of styles with the raw vocals and the pop style instrumentation on the song. The styles contrast but also give the song that special feeling. Grampa is another big favourite on Hope This Ends Well. It begins with just Vida's bass and his vocals. This style again quickly has me yearning to sing-along. It doesn't take long for the rest of the band, Caleb Corpuz and Caleb Limbaga on guitars and Ethan Limbaga on drums, to join in to create a near perfect pop punk track. It seems to go at a faster pace than anything else so far on Hope This Ends Well and it's so easy to get swept away with the song. It's a track about trying to get on with your life despite the grief you're suffering due to the loss of relative. It's a heartbreaking song when you really get down to the bare bones of the track.
The seventh song on the album is Pencil Fight. Again wasting no time in getting going, there's a chaotic energy in the song with the band seemingly all doing their own thing at times in the song before coming back together for the choruses. It's about breaking up and having a extremely hard time dealing with it. There's a bitterness in the song that everyone feels at the end of a relationship with Vida's raw vocals adding plenty of emotion and anger to the track. The penultimate song on Hope This Ends Well is A.C.P. This track had me thinking of Jeff Rosenstock after my first listen, in that it sounds like a rough around the edges pop song that could seemingly go off in any direction. It's totally rambunctious and I love it for this reason. I really enjoyed the storytelling aspect of the song, with it feeling as if you can picture exactly what's going on in the song. Last up is Four More Beers. This is a slower and more methodical track about using beer to escape all the bad feelings you're having. The song is an emotional one that builds throughout, really pulling tightly on your heart before just breaking you. What a way to finish the album.
Hope This Ends Well shows a new band with a huge upside. On this album Feeble show they can write some great songs that people will relate to and will really grow an emotional attachment to. All nine songs will have you shouting along whilst being in bits. Feeble are a fantastic new band and I hope to see them grow and grow.
Stream and download Hope This Ends Well here: https://feeblehnl.bandcamp.com/album/hope-this-ends-well
Like Feeble here: https://www.facebook.com/feeblehnl/
This review was written by Colin Clark.
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