Search - The Shore :: The Shore

Not Innovation, But Reinvention

Lux Valentine | West Chester, PA USA | 10/27/2004

(4 out of 5 stars)

"If you are craving the sounds of The Verve, the spellbinding contemporary British pop band with a front man possessing cheek bones in high-relief, well...there's always your copy of Urban Hymns or Richard Ashcroft's solo project Alone With Everybody. If that just won't do, try nabbing yourself a copy of The Shore's self-titled debut, full of dreamy tracks with mournful yet ardent vocals, piano interludes, and evocative guitars.



This isn't the first time the band has been compared to The Verve. The Shore, a talented young L.A.-based quartet formed in the summer of 2002, has been inspiring critics to make comparisons to Coldplay, Oasis, Radiohead, and even U2. Giving it a listen, you realize that those critics are right. Every track feels familiar. You know you know this band's songs, you must've heard them somewhere before.



Even though it may not sound exactly unique, does that mean that it's bad, trite, or cliché? Not exactly. In fact, it sounds familiar because it works; as opposed to be annoying, it is satisfying in its sameness, and yet at the same time it's refreshing because they take that recognizable sound and reinvent it. Founder and front man Ben Ashley has obviously been invoking all the right muses and smashing them together in order to create this melodic and introspective otherworldly first album. Released in August 2004, the songs conjure up images of lonely deserts, dusky cross-country road-trips, and summer sunsets taking place in the 1970s. The opening track, "The Hard Road", delivers a nostalgic desperation with twangy guitars and leaves the feeling of loss, but the fulfilling kind of loss. "Hold On" is the longing, beautiful track you listen to on the lonely bus ride home with your face pressed up against the window glass, taking pride in your misery. Not every track on the album is a "downer", though; "Firefly" is a catchy, upbeat song with scratchy, passionate vocals, aside from the illusory falsetto chorus, and the mid-tempo "Everything We Are" will have their audience moving, being a quality pop song while still retaining meaning and integrity.



The Verve may have become another footnote in the history of Music, allowing new bands to spring up and take their place. However, in this case, that may not be so bad. Welcome to The Shore.

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Arguably Better Than Anything You've Heard Before

Paul D. Wegele | Phoenix (Hades) | 04/17/2005

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Words do not do The Shore justice. Rarely, does 1 find a cd that has so many stellar songs one after another. Most musicians don't write a career's worth of music this good. I saw The Shore live at a rock venue here in Phoenix, AZ. Their performance live was every bit as good as the music that I have become obsessed with listening to every day in my house, at work, and every where I go. As I wait for the bus, walk home from the grocery store, and do my laundry, I sing their soulful, emotive, beautiful music. To call this music "POP" is to do it a disservice. It isn't pop. It is rock and roll with possibly the best singer modern rock music has created in the last twenty years. Some of David Gilmour's work or Matthew Good from Beautiful Midnight could come close. They could come close but, only with a specific song or two. Nearly all of these ten songs have Ben Ashley showing the music world what real feelings, real loss, and real tears sound like when they are lamented from the vocal chords of a strikingly talented singer. The lyrics feel like a river, and the music feels like being lifted up to a heaven we were taught existed once. The building polyphonic orgasm of "Coming Down" is unparalleled in the history of rock. I cannot imagine a human being that couldn't appreciate this music. I've played this music to a wide variety of people from different backgrounds, some who listen to gangster rap and some who listen to christian music and some who listen to jazz and some who listen to death metal. Inevitably, I hear, "hey who is this playing right now". It's The Shore. That's all you have to say. It's The Shore. Download this album, share it with your friends, send it to an ex-girlfriend even if she hates you. You can communicate things with music that you cannot do with any other media including words which is why I hesitate writing this review at all."

Rolling Stone Review

goodmusic | brooklyn, ny | 08/03/2004

(5 out of 5 stars)

"No one would be likely to fault you for mistaking the meandering melodies in "Hard Road," the opening song and first single off the Shore's self-titled debut, for the Verve's big comeback. Vocalist Ben Ashley channels Richard Ashcroft's vibrato so well, you'd think him possessed if you didn't already know that Ashcroft's still kicking. But by the time the third song, "Take What's Mine," rolls in, it becomes clear that this is more than Brit-rock karaoke by an American band. The Shore add their own dimensions by seamlessly blending in the kind of dreamy multi-tonal harmonies long ago mastered by groups from their native left coast, such as the Beach Boys and the Mamas and the Papas. The resulting songs are sunnier than their U.K. idols' but darker than their West Coast forefathers', making it an all around nostalgic album of laid-back, pleasurable tunes.

KRISTIN ROTH www.rollingstone.com

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