Album Review: NEEDTOBREATHE - 'Out of Body'
The Grammy-nominated, South Carolina rockers NEEDTOBREATHE are back with Out of Body, their sixth studio album to date: and possibly their strongest too.
NEEDTOBREATHE are often pigeon holed as a Christian rock band. Sure, many of their songs can be religious in tone —for instance, 2014’s ‘Multiplied’, or, delving deeper into their incredible back catalogue, 2007’s more overtly praiseful ‘Signature of Divine (Yahweh)’ — but the trio (formerly four piece) of Bear Rinehart, Seth Bolt, and Josh Lovelace are so much more. Made up of wonderful harmonies, the type of music that’s as at home in the centre of a sold out stadium as it is sat around a campfire, and lyrics that are as optimistic as they are genuinely moving, NEEDTOBREATHE have long been something special — and new album Out of Body is no different. It finds the trio — now without founding member Bo Rinehart for the first time — examining life, family, and friends through the kaleidoscope of age. Whether the band are hanging on to youthful innocence, exploring the knowledge that age and experience can bring, or simply finding that reason to live for, Out Of Body is... hopeful. Hopeful for a better future, a better tomorrow. A better self. It’s truly a powerful and beautiful album.
Opener Mercy’s Shore is surprisingly, deceptively understated. A repeated guitar riff and a repeated drum beat pave the way for Bear to, from the bat, truly showcase his voice. Anyone who has heard either NEEDTOBREATHE or Bear’s solo project, Wilder Woods, shouldn’t be surprised. It’s calming and quiet, like a warm blanket wrapping you in it’s embrace, until it explodes with a unique, yet welcomingly friendly, South Carolina drawl. It jokes about the innocence of youth — thinking that “God was a girl at my school” — while questioning the longevity of life. It’s an incredibly existential start to the album, yet it couldn’t be better. The whole song is like the ebb and flow of a wave, as it brims with the inexorable power of life and love.
And that’s just the first song!
Each song truly is a labour of passion and love. Admittedly, the titles could perhaps be a little more subtle — for instance, ‘Alive’ is exhilarating, fast paced, and describes the need to feel, well, alive — but that fails to damage the zeal-filled songs themselves. Lead single Hang On, for instance — which has already started garnering well-deserved critical acclaim, and features in both the soundtrack for the PGA Tour’s Impact Initiative and the season finale of American Idol — is a roaring rollercoaster of a song. It’s impossible not to enjoy it, with a catchy chorus that screams of wild eyed abandon, as you simply try to ‘hold on’ yourself.
Similarly, standout track ‘Who Am I’ isn’t exactly on the nose; but God is it good. Opening with some delicate harmonies, the song starts gentle: Bear’s heavenly vocals over the near silent twinkling of keys. It soon builds though: his vocals break into admiration for his love — “who am I to be loved by you’ he gushes, his voice near shattering, as moved as it is. Questioning himself, the song builds to an explosive crescendo that leaves you desolate. “I don’t understand where your love comes from” he cries, during one particularly devastating moment, “I can’t imagine that I’ve earned your trust”. The song leaves you broken at the despair; yet the song is also, at its heart, weirdly optimistic. It leaves you hopeful for such a closeness in your own life. Or grateful, if indeed you already have such a one. A simple title for an indelibly powerful single.
Elsewhere comes title track ‘Out of Body’, a more jazz-esque song that cries out to be danced to; the track is constantly moving, much like a listener will be. Echoing harmonies offer a backdrop for the song to create within itself a round of sorts; sure to be a hit live, whenever that becomes a thing again!
My personal favourite though has to be Child Again. Everything is on point. The vocals fluctuate between raspy and contemplative, to falsetto and beyond. The lyrics are beautiful — “pain means my soul’s awake”, Bear cries at one point, a particularly inspirational way to look at heartache. But none of this touches on the latter half of the song. Bear’s vocals are at his most vulnerable over the held piano chords; in the near silence, they become even more devastating. “You're my hope unbroken/ You're my innocence” he professes, in what is possibly the purest outpouring of love possible. The entire song is just so bare, so open. The instrumentals are muted; they are still just present enough to be effective, but manage to succeed in not drowning out a single nuance in Bear’s words. Simply stunning.
As good as the band is as a whole, it truly is Bear that makes the album so sublime. Every word is loaded with a sense of pathos and emotion that overwhelms you in a torrent of pain and beauty, leaving you breathless. The instrumentals of the three know just when to take prominence, in a jolting escalation, and just when to fade off into near-insignificance. The mastering alone is a masterclass.
Listening to Out of Body makes you miss live gigs all over again. A slew of anthemic choruses surround a sense of poetic intimacy that leads to a heavenly album of epic proportions; We can only hope that the trio grace our shores again soon.
Words by James O’Sullivan