ALBUM REVIEW: AJR - OK ORCHESTRA (2021)

Yup, we’re back with yet another album review already, what’s the album we’re looking at today?

AJR - OK ORCHESTRA (2021)

Genre(s): Electropop, Alt-Pop

I’ve said before that I don’t really like AJR’s overall aesthetic and sound that nakedly rips off Blurryface-era Twenty One Pilots, and as is, that album, to be charitable, has honestly aged a bit weirdly. That said, AJR have made songs I liked in the past, but far more often they deliver songs that I hate, going back to their terrible debut single “I’m Ready”, that said, I had heard ahead of time a few songs I didn’t mind or even liked on this album, so OK, ORCHESTRA, what did you play for us?

Ok, trust me, as someone who’s listened to three of these guys’ albums, this is the best album I’ve heard from them. It’s not good by any means. But, the potential I saw on Neotheater definitely started blooming here, I’ll say it. That said, there are a few songs here that tended to get handicapped by bad production choices, like on “My Play”, a genuinely heartbreaking and effectively emotional song about the brothers’ parents divorce and the “play” in the song being what unites the parents (I don’t know, maybe I’m utterly butchering its meaning) where the distortion on Jack Met’s voice actually amplifies the emotion, and I was trying so so so hard to like it, but that sample sounds really ugly and just completely ruins the song, sorry.

That said, I did say there were shining moments on this album, “Way Less Sad” avoids a lot of the problems that “BANG!” had by actually having a groove and being pretty damn catchy. But there is also unfortunately the fact that this album has my least favorite AJR song to date - “World’s Smallest Violin”, which to AJR’s credit, most of my hate for that song is the fact that the first time I heard it was at possibly the worst time. I was still in the hospital, at the time only a couple months after having suffered a massive hemorrhagic stroke, and Jack Met’s flat delivery made the entire song sound like it was being sarcastic, making the line “The world's smallest violin really needs an audience” feel like it was directly mocking me for my problem, or calling it insignificant. But I do understand that I’m likely alone when it comes to that, I’ll admit that the melody here isn’t terrible, and if one were to say they legitimately enjoy it, I could definitely see how, feeling like your problems don’t matter in comparison to someone else’s bigger problems is definitely a relatable sell that even I’ll admit I feel now. I see the appeal even in “BANG!”, which I can’t even get all that angry at anymore, like the underlying keyboard melody which isn’t terrible, but the “metronome” bit is still a bafflingly awful production decision so the song is still very bad, even if not as atrocious as I used to think. Honestly my hate for that song may have been oversold to begin with.

So if you want my final thoughts...this is an album where AJR’s talents start sprouting, it’s still not good, but I can only hope they continue this trajectory for their next album, but really, I don’t have any energy left to hate this group, AJr hate is honestly overexposed at this point, let's just move on. So overall, final verdict...5/10, if you’re a fan, you’ll probably enjoy this. As for the best track on the album, I'll go with “Way Less Sad”, because I liked that song way more than I probably should’ve back in 2021. Let's go with “My Play” for honorable mention. If the production was better I probably would’ve given it the best. Now for the worst...I’ll go for “World’s Smallest Violin” because that song genuinely offends me, I feel that some may be surprised I didn't put "BANG!" as the worst, but as I said, my hate for that song was probably oversold to begin with. And “Bummerland” gets the dishonorable mention, because the lyrics are abysmally stupid even by their standards plus the falsetto from Jack Met is painfully ear-scraping.

So that's that, thank you guys so much for reading! Next album review is not gonna be from these guys, don’t worry haha, it’ll be an album I utterly adore to no end, that’s all I’ll say, but until then, I’ll see you!