CORPORATE LINE: Capitol Records will release Face The Promise, Bob Seger’s first studio album in 11 years. Face The Promise opens a masterful new chapter in a songbook that has captured the dreams, ideals, yearnings and truths of the American experience for a remarkable forty years. The album’s lead-off single is entitled “Wait For Me.”
Bob Seger is universally acknowledged by fans and musicians as one of the few truly defining voices of American music. His vivid portraits of working class lives convey the hope and the heartbreak implicit in the American dream. Face The Promise marks Seger’s return in classic form: urgent, honest, rousing, timeless — a new and compelling testament to rock and roll’s undying redemptive power.
Seger has sold nearly 50 million albums in his career. Among his eleven platinum and seven multi-platinum awards, Against the Wind, Night Moves and Stranger in Town have each been RIAA-certified for over 5 million album sales in the U.S., as has his massively-influential 1976 breakthrough classic, Live Bullet. The 1994 Greatest Hits collection has sold over 7 million copies, in an unbroken 600-week run in the upper reaches of the Billboard Pop Catalog chart. He is a Grammy winner (“Against the Wind,” Best Rock Performance by a Group or Duo, 1980) and a 2004 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee.
Observed through the eyes of the outsider and the everyman, the reveler and the romantic, the songs of Bob Seger exemplify the classic in classic rock: “Against The Wind,“ “Turn The Page,” “Rock And Roll Never Forgets,” “Night Moves,” “Katmandu,” “Old Time Rock and Roll” and ”Beautiful Loser,” to name just a few.
THE GOOD:
“Wreck This Heart” – Seger can still make barnburners. This song will have you singing along as the guitars screech and soar atop a signature Seger melody.
“Face The Promise” – Seger reaches into the delta with a blues song aobut working on the river. Segers worn voice could almost convince you he’s lived ever word of it.
“Wait For Me” – There is comfort in Seger’s voice and his ability to make a love song sound cool the same way he did with “Against The Wind”.
THE AVERAGE:
“No Matter Who You Are” – The song feels a bit too macho and it doesn’t sound much like Seger as he sings with more bravado and bass then usual. The lyrics about feeding the beast come off a little cheesy as does “Are You.”
“Simplicity” – “Complex theories have their place” and “don’t get lost in foggy stuff” are interesting lyrics about a song where Seger profess to wanting a more simple life.
“No More” – A nice song—but a bit too bloated and resembles Meat Loaf.
“Real Mean Bottle” f/Kid Rock – Not a bad duet with Kid Rock.
“Between” – This song about the greenhouse effect and the government tapping our phones are without much effect.
“The Answer In The Question” f/Patty Loveless – Seger is better at rocking then doing country ballads.
THE BAD:
Nothing.
FRANKLY: After a silent decade Bob Seger sounds fresh and refreshing! Seger’s songs aren’t a departure of his earlier years and maybe that is why we are so comfortable with each and every one of them. One problem with Face The Promise is how many ballads appear on the album and there are far too many songs that feature a backup singer. Seger is best when he is rocking a song rather than crooning.
+ Rae Gun
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