British-Irish boy band, One Direction have invaded the hearts of young girls across North America. Under the direction of former American Idol judge Simon Cowell the group was formed from the popular England talent show The X- Factor where each auditioned separately and later made the now five member boy band. They released their debut album, Up All Night on March 13th and have been toping Billboard 200 chart.
What Makes You Beautiful, the promotional track has been getting a lot of success. It’s a pretty pop song that mixes a fun bubbly sound with a positive message. Thousands of teen girls can swoon to the pretty melodies in this fun spring hit. Gotta Be You (2012 US Version) is a slower song that sounds like a mix of Justin Timberlake and Coldplay. The verses are a little bland focusing on one members voice, but the chorus is gorgeous with the falsetto followed by some harmonizing and ending with the nice sound of strings.
One Thing going back to that ’90’s boy band sound with this simple song. The guitar rifts during the verse are nice and the chorus goes into a full on belt from the group that sounds really great. More Than This shows off their voices a little more with a mid-tempo track filled with heart wrenching lyrics like :”when he lays you down, I might die inside”. The title track, Up All Night, is a party. It makes you want to dance and stay up all night. There’s a break before the second verse, but it sounds a little like a bad cheer and lacks that extra something. I Wish goes back to the ‘I want you’ sound that was very evident in More Than This. This isn’t as great and since it’s so similar to the previous song. Tell Me a Lie bouncy guitar that lives up to the saying that ‘ignorance is bliss’ romantically speaking. The song sounds similar to the What Makes You Beautiful, so this is very underwhelming to listen to. Taken goes for an acoustic sound and instead of that upbeat that was in most of the previous songs, this is a little more somber.
Time for a much needed change of sound that ,I Want brings. The song sounds pretty with the bouncy piano intro and fades into the chorus that sounds very similar to Tainted Love. The break in the song is very nice with a more calmed down version of the intro and a line of ‘I want’ sung softly. Back to the happy pop sound, Everything About You has more personality, but isn’t as catchy.
Strong production paired with strong vocals makes Same Mistakes a nice ballad type song. Save You Tonight sounds like an update *NSYNC song. This song lacks that appeal that the promotional track does and sounds like a filler track. Stole My Heart sounds like a song that would be great for a remix. It would sound better without so much synth and sounds like another filler song; there’s nothing that sticks out about this song.
Who knew boy bands would make a comeback? One Direction bring that fresh sound to pop music that it was straying from; they have a more innocent sound. Up All Night was a pretty good debut album for them ,but there were songs that didn’t need to be added. One Direction have potential and most of the album was well produced. Up All Night provides great pop music for young teens with a positive message. I rate this 3/5.
