I can appreciate an artist wanting to stay relevant and mainstream with what is on the radio, but when that artist changes his sound to the point where his band sounds like any other mainstream pop rock radio band out currently, it becomes an issue for me. Daughtry continues their trend towards a softer pop rock sound as they did in the last album. I personally prefer the harder rock albums like the first three, not because of my preference of the harder sound as I like some of his earlier ballads, but because of the very reason I mentioned above. I close my eyes and I hear any other band out there, Maroon 5, Imagine Dragons, etc. Daughtry had a distinct sound with Chris' powerful voice backed by some rocking guitars in their first 3 albums. The songs here are ok, but apart from one or two songs that sounds a bit like the older albums, lacks anything that stands out or is anything different from the rest of the pop rock scene. There is a noticeable lack of guitars combined with the artificial sound of a drum machine and synthesizers makes this probably my least favorite album from the band. The album is overall not bad and has some decent songs, but Daughtry sounds less like Daughtry and more like some other band. I can only hope that they return to a harder sound with the next album.
3 stars