You may or may not recall a band by the name A Change of Pace. This band in particular only stuck out by virtue of their shameless ripping off of well-known riffs from such bands as Thursday, Finch, and probably Underoath as well. Not a tremendous career starting point.

Well, it's now a year and a half later, and they're back. A Change of Pace have marched back into the incredibly original and groundbreaking pop-rock scene with 42 minutes worth of new material on their latest record, Prepare the Masses. For what? The same thing they could easily hear every time Fueled by Ramen releases a new album? That's hardly anything to get excited over.

Regardless, and much to my chagrin, this album was put out. Immortal Records is the guilty party (you'll be hearing from my attorney shortly) and for the better or for the worse (definitely worse) there's nothing that can be done about it. Well no, actually, I'll tell you what can be done about it. Don't buy this album! Novel, I know, but simplicity is often the best way to combat a serious issue, and there is no more serious an issue than bad music.

And when I say ‘bad music' I mean bad music. To their credit, they've improved tenfold since the last record. To the credit of my 3rd grade math teacher, I know that 10 times zero is still zero. That should paint an accurate picture as to where on the scale of suck you will find this -- approaching the top. Enough hyperbole though, I suppose I owe you an explanation as to why I'm giving this band such a verbal smackdown. If anyone can listen to this album, and differentiate any songs from any others (besides the token acoustic closer) I will send you a dollar. I make this bet in full confidence that my wallet will never even be touched. This is because every song was written to follow the exact same verse-chorus structure. There are bands who can do this well, true, but A Change of Pace surely isn't one of them. The vocals are just like that of any other band biting the pop-rock trend, and the lyrics are laughable at very best. Cliché, nonsensical, and repetitious, it is the triumvirate from musical hell.

So yes, A Change of Pace made an improvement.

They're no longer ripping off other bands to aid them in writing terrible songs, they've now the capacity to do that all on their own. These guys are really coming of age.