Mainstay is becoming who they are
Posted June 09, 2008
By Nathan,
Coming off their debut, Well Meaning Fiction, and a hit single (“take away”) the alternative light rock band Mainstay is geared up for their sophomore project. Aside from their sometimes solemn rock sound, Mainstay, is more interested in writing powerful lyrics. “Lyrically we want to write lyrics that challenge believers and unbelievers alike” says front man Justin Anderson. Now with more recognition, the pressure is on for Mainstay to maintain and improve on their reputation.
Mainly light rock, Mainstays music has some alternative, and a surprising amount of praise and worship, but the albums opener and title track, “become who you are”, is a tremendous alternative medium rock tune where Justin Anderson’s vocals shine. “Stars are singing” has a pretty good up tempo sound, but it has a worship tune at heart, and “away from you” has a solid sound especially at the end of the refrain. The single “where my heart belongs” is soft rock, but its radio friendly. “Am I keeping you away” picks up as the song goes along and “when you came down” is an upbeat song, but neither are particularly impressive.
A fan favorite “believe” has a more melancholy rock approach to the tune which turns out well. The music in the verses in “only one” set up well for the light and emotional refrain. The light alternative solemn sounding “island” is a solid song where more emotion comes out. One of the harder songs on the album, “roads” has a heavy intro and continues to present a medium upbeat rock tune. The refrain of “don’t I look the same” over arches a solid solemn sounding song but the importance of “story” is low on the album. The ending song “hang on” doesn’t flatter the album a whole lot.
Anderson is very passionate about not selling out or dumbing down the lyrics and getting back to sin and repentance. But alas, much is the same with Mainstay’s lyrics as they fall into more than enough cliché’s and leave too many song unengaging. The best bits of song writing are some of the more indirect, but clear mentions of faith on “island” and “away from you”. “Roads” is a solid song and so is “become who you are” (‘and I’m finding each time that you fall, /You’re just becoming who you are’). “Where my heart belongs” is all about redemption after making bad decisions (‘You gave yourself to those /Who never cared about your soul’), but most the album is simply solemn sounding praise and worship that has been going around (“when you come down”, “only one”, and “hang on”).
Mainstay’s music is solid, as there is just enough verity to stay above cheesy reproduction of the modern Christian music light rock/praise and worship scene. But sadly despite a handful of songs on Become who you Are is pretty much that: praise and worship. And it won’t attract the type of audience that the band was hoping for.
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