The fifth album by AMERICAN STEEL is out. Or should we rather say, the second album in phase 2, meaning after the band's reunion? The album is released through Fat Wreck, which naturally sets expectations, as anything from this label is rarely bad. Perhaps that's why I'm struggling with this album. The twelve songs are all perfectly recorded, and that's another problem I'm grappling with. The album simply sounds too professional. It's too polished. Everything that could be rough, everything that could have character has been smoothed out in favor of a clean production. The different influences that the band has come through well, but here everything is just really too polished. Whether it's pop-punk, punk influences, or high school pop, everything has been ironed out in one direction. With “DEAR FRIENDS AND GENTLE HEARTS,” there's a strong focus on radio play and sales. Live, the band may still hit hard and be fun, but the album is just too polished. This reminds me, even if it's stylistically a bit different, of the MAD CADDIES, whose recent albums also sound more like pop and mellow rock than the energetic MAD CADDIES of their early days.
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