The spirit of Charlie Kirk or moreso weird family values has entered Will Toledo with the release of Joe's Story, a frankly bizarre rework of Teens of Denial to coincide with it being 10 years old. This is an album originally about being a teenager who has messy relationships does drugs, fucks, drinks etc. College age 18-20 year old shit. This new version is quote, "what the album was meant to be" apparently it wasn't supposed to have bad words. Must have been an accident, i guess.
The record is a strange beast. Mostly reusing parts of the original but changing up the mixing and occasionally being overdubbed with lead singer Will Toledo's errata of an angsty record made by someone who had just gotten signed to a major record label and presumably must have felt like he had all the pressure in the world on his shoulders. This reissue taints the emotions on display from the original release.
Included with the record are concept album-esque paragraphs explaining what happens betweens songs a la Joe's Garage. In these little sections we are spoonfed information about what the intended meaning is behind each track. In addition, we are given information that we could not know otherwise, leading me to read the text like the central scruitinizer. Two songs from the original have been outright removed, replaced with songs that i find it hard to believe were "always intended to be on there" also, removing the song alluding to the concept of found family and instead focusing soley on the biological family unit is so weird. It feels VERY christian. Which is just jarring to hear from a group as divorced from being clean as CSH is. I understand it's supposed to be a concept album but it doesn't work as one to me, period.
I cant understand the quotes i've heard. The idea that this is supposed to be "the preferred version to be heard over the original" is so weird. Why? I understand will is...30 something now? But like, surely will can still remember that his own teenage years werent so clean or self-censored. The band's body of work proves this.
1937 state park's "xylophone ribs" solo got fucked up BAD.
In short, the white zone is for loading and unloading. If you can load or unload go to the white zone.
And also please remake How to Leave Town and Nervous Young Man next I want a good laugh.
Gonna make one small edit here to add on that religious themes are a consistent thing across will's work all the way back to "1" i just think the references to it have been poorly utilized here. Essentially: Teens of Denial (Christian Rock version)
