General feedback about Journey’s current vocalist, Arnel Pineda from the Philippines, is he sounds like Steve Perry who brought Journey to stardom with Neal Schon, the lead guitarist. It’s a known story that the vocal resemblance was the reason Pineda was hired to keep the life for Journey to stay successful (=profitable) on the stage. Well, Journey finally decided to make a new album during the pandemic 11 years after their last Eclipse album although most of the members weren’t eager to create one before the pandemic, and they just released the second album since Arnel joined. Freedom is Journey’s fifteenth studio album in their 47 years of a recording career.
My opinion: I really don’t think Arnel Pineda’s voice resembles Steve Perry.
Arnel might sound similar to Steve at a concert, but they are two different things for the recordings.
Arnel’s voice can’t even be compared with Steve Perry, especially the dynamism on the high keys is different. Arnel’s voice is rougher than Steve, too. Other aspects include volume, stretch, polish, vocal identity, and charisma…needless to say, Steve Perry surpasses.
If Arnel Pineda wasn’t the Journey’s vocalist, he would get 4 stars. Not a bad vocalist. But unfortunately, he has an important role in this mega band. Being intimate with Steven Perry, necessary or not. That was the reason he was hired. In this case, he failed on this new album again.
Those are the thoughts I’ve already had while listening to the first song, “Together We Run”. Keeping the same musical direction from the masterpiece of masterpieces, Frontier, (1983), is great, but because of the reason, the comparison with Steve Perry is unavoidable until the end of the album.
The second song, “Don’t Give Up On Us”,…this is a joke, right? The intro is the copy of “Separate Ways (Worlds Apart)”! It’s not only “sounds like”. 95% is the famous intro of “Separate Ways (Worlds Apart)”. What is the purpose of this copy? Making fans retrospective about the past back in 1983? If the main was better than the original, the idea of copied intro could be interesting, but the truth is the song is average without impressive hooks. Meaning the intro is just fishy.
Overall, current Journey tried their best to sound like the golden era to catch the old fans with this album, but I can’t feel their pure passion for music. A significant example is “Don’t Give Up On Us”. And again overall, the album lacks the impressive hooks and superior melodies that made Journey famous. That resulted in a medley of boring songs and making the album flat. Rocking melodies finally come with the intro of the fourth song “You Got The Best Of Me”, but the verse fails like a crashing airplane when Arnel’s voice didn’t fly with the upward melodies. But oh Journey, what happened? You never did that until Raised on Radio! This is a sad fact despite both Neal Schon and Jonathan Cain having the extraordinary songwriting skill to keep their wheels running high in the sky without doing the self-imitation and being flat.
Arnel Pineda and Journey might have chemistry on the stage, but not the case with the recording. The different styles. Neal Schon is a smooth operator on songwriting with dramatic and sometimes symphonic like “After Grow”. Arnel’s vocal style is more straightforward. Depending on the song, the difference is oil and water. His voice finally matches with an 80s-like sticky rock tune “Let It Rain”, but the song is boring. Only the dramatic rock song that has beautiful harmony with Arnel’s voice is driving “Don’t Go”, then “Life Rolls On”, but too late to wait. They’re the last part of the album.
Another question about the album is production. Neal Schon told Rolling Stone about simultaneous remote recording; recording Arnel’s voice in Manila while engineering in the U.S. at the same time. Is that why? His voice was distanced…behind. Honestly, I really can’t think this is the recording of the 21st century even though this is called advanced technology. Lack of dynamism overall. A good example is “Come Away With Me”. Sounds like just placing two separate sheets of sound parallel. Aggressive instrumental and totally flat vocal behind it. Totally unmatched.
The best part of the album is Neal Schon. I can listen to the album just for Neal Schon. His guitar nothing changed. Still vivid and shining without a bit of fade, dynamic flow like the pure jet stream, and passionate with Impressionism. Simply beautiful.
Journey has a significant right reason to exist without Steve Perry; he is not an original member but Neal Schon is. But if Journey wants to keep their old glory shining and active with still making new albums in the future, this poor quality is unacceptable.
OVERALL POINTS: 49/100
- Songs: ★★
- Originality: ★★★★★
- Thrills: ★
- Song orders: ★★★
- Vocal: ★★+1/2
- Background: ★★★★
- Sound: ★
- Production: ★
- Strong songs: N/A
EXTRA (NOT COUNTED TOWARD THE OVERALL POINTS)
- Title: B
- Album cover: A
RELEASE DATE (US): 07/08/2022
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