Martinez Tribune The website of the Martinez Tribune.
BY KARYN A. POKLETAR
Professionally known as Anderson East, Michael Cameron Anderson grew up in a small town of about 20,000 in Athens, Alabama. His new album Maybe We Never Die follows his 2018 hit Encore.
Not surprising for a southern kid, East’s primary musical influence was the gospel hymn. He sang in his Pastor-grandfather’s Baptist church. The artist moved to Nashville after graduating from Middle State University, earning his degree in musical engineering. He’s been in the music business for over 12 years and yet, there remains the question as to what his genre actually is. On his fifth album, Maybe We Never Die, Anderson East is trying to establish…something?
A genre has a recognizable and distinct sound, a pattern. This album would not be that. The opening track and title tune “Maybe We Never Die” finds East taking a soulful slant as he begins the song in his tenor voice which turns into an overproduced, indistinguishable falsetto “You and I live forever//You and I live forever//You and I live forever.” He isn’t established enough to paddle into the sea of expanded musicality! The singer wanders around music-land, lost, as he leaves his previous sound, on a park bench, somewhere in Nashville?
He’s traded his (almost signature?) gruff voice for a swath of strangely curated musical styles. The plaintive track “Madelyn,” although a romantic and smooth ride, only assists in compounding his stylistic missteps, East’s previous powerhouse vocals (is it affectation?) are all but absent on this album, supplanted instead by his boring croon. There is nothing distinct about the artist, the arrangements have thrown too much at East hoping he can rally. He cannot.
On this album, there is something for everyone! We have Country! Blues and disco! There’s even 80’s rock on this over processed plod-through, of mostly slow songs. East stated in an interview he is “definitely not country” and concomitantly, he declares he is, also, “not an R &B singer.” But, those two genres – Country/R & B – are what he has been recognized for!
Additionally, he’s goes for that disco vibe on the track “Drugs.” This song is where his identity vanishes. After a decade and change in the music industry, East says “Going to the gym, having coffee, or going to church” is tantamount, in his observation, to “addiction of the diabolical kind.” “Drugs,” finds his falsetto so indistinct it might as well be a Midi plug-in.
On two of the tracks, “If You Really Love Me” and “Like Nothing Ever Happened,” both songs attempt romantic overtones but would have found a much better and believable fit with balladeers like Teddy Pendergrass or Marvin Gaye.
The singer-songwriter needs to stop his aberrational attempts at genre busting. It’s hard to capture East’s rhythm. What’s next? Rap? Rockabilly?
The song “I Hate You” is one macraméd tangle of victimization and co-dependency, with a commercial quotient still at the fore. Banking on the unoriginal, “Hood Of My Car” panders for an easy win. East is ready – as Adam Corolla would say, to -“Get it on!”//I want to take you right here on the hood of my car.” For the most part, (if) you can get through the whole album, you will ask the questions: “Who are you and what are you trying to do, Mr East?”
We’ll hear some of these songs getting radio play, but on which station? This is a weird approach to an album, we need to know who you are as an artist before we follow you into a dark cave where sloppy, genre-soup bubbles over the fire. The final track “Interstellar Outer Space” is some kind of cosmic interlude. Creeping bell tones front East’s aggressive, vocal screech, which is cringe worthy, as he intones insipid lyrics: “Take me to your leader//I swear I come in peace.”
There is way too much happening on Maybe We Never Die with no focus evident on this hodge-podge of a release. Vocally, East has hung up his raspy voice, which he’s used previously. Instead, he’s trying to appease his current handlers with a mish-mash album. Whether or not this approach resonates with fans remains to be seen.
Maybe We Never Die is an inauthentic, ambiguous, crossover album which might deliver a kill-shot to the singer-songwriter’s career. This album will not be “critically acclaimed,” and Anderson East had best cinch up his talent belt if there is to be a viable sixth album in the future.
