 
In 2003 Yellowcard released their breakthrough
album ‘Ocean Avenue’ the album has
now gone on and sold over 1 million copies becoming
the most successful album release of Yellowcards
lengthy career, now 10 years on Yellowcard have
just re-recorded ‘Ocean Avenue’ in
an acoustic format and are due to release it on
the 13th August to coincide with the tenth anniversary
of the original albums release.
With the re-working of ‘Ocean Avenue’
Yellowcard have managed to keep the arrangements
pretty much spot on to the original and just toned
down the guitars and forceful nature of some of
songs, take album opener ‘Way Away’
for example, the original version of the songs
come in at 100 miles per hour with Yellowcard
showing off everything that is good about punk
in a fast paced 3minutes, the re-working of the
song is arranged in the same way but instead of
having a big in your face guitar piece leading
the song you have a tinny sounding acoustic guitar
and beautiful violin sounds and Ryan Key fully
shining with his solid vocals which have come
on leaps and bounds over the years.
I always classed ‘Oceans Avenue’ as
the heavy Yellowcard album because if you compare
it to any of their other albums especially their
most recent releases the songs have a pure punk
vibe running through where everything has been
turned up a couple of extra notches where as their
latest releases have sat right in the middle of
the pop-punk territory leaning more towards pop
than it does punk, and this is why it is good
to hear the likes of ‘Breathing’,
‘Life Of A Salesman’, ‘Only
One’ and ‘Believe’ in a more
toned down sing-a-long format, with ‘Believe’
being one of the strongest tracks on offer due
to it maintaining the epic opening.
‘View From Heaven’ and ‘Ocean
Avenue’ are both right up there with ‘Believe’
as being the best tracks on the album with ‘View
From Heaven’ standing out not only because
of its well written lyrics but also for the fact
that Yellowcard have included a fun sounding banjo
piece, ‘Ocean Avenue’ is the song
which pushed Yellowcard into the major league
of punk and it sounds so good hearing the song
in a more raw stripped down way sounding like
a summer party anthem, whilst ‘Believe’
you just need to listen to the pace of the beautiful
violins which are so pleasing on the ears.
‘Ocean Avenue (Acoustic)’ is like
a thank you to the fans from Yellowcard as we
all know that Yellowcard fans are suckers for
acoustic music mainly due to the fact that Yellowcard
really do own it when they go down the acoustic
route, they re-released their 2011 album ‘When
You’re Through Thinking, Say Yes’
and for me personally I happen to listen to the
acoustic offering more than the standard release
because I just find myself getting lost in the
music more and enjoying every second, ‘Ocean
Avenue (Acoustic)’ is a must have for all
Yellowcard fans and I just hope that in 3 years
time that Yellowcard decide to give ‘Lights
And Sounds’ the acoustic treatment.
4/5
Review by Trigger
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