This Loud Morning (2011): Album Review

Three years after the release of David Cook’s self-titled debut album, we get This Loud Morning. Cook talks about the album loosely following the story of a gestation cycle of a relationship from start to finish in a one night’s dream. The album cover shows Cook standing, in a field of speakers, showing off the connection to the title This Loud Morning. It’s a nice album cover and a little cleverer than the ones we see these days. The title comes from a lyric in the the final song of the album “Give me one more quiet night/’Fore this loud morning gets it right/And does me in”. The album kicks off with “Circadian”, a power-horse of a song. The song starts with a lullaby sounding twinkle, the kind of music you’d hear in one of those wind up sleep/music boxes and slowly moves into some pretty sounding piano chords. The subdued, deep vocals from Cook then begin to present itself followed by the guitars and drums. The musicality on this song is incredible, from the instrumentation, that already seems like a big step forward from Cook’s last stuff, to the vocals and the lyrics, “you can’t escape this drying ink”, the song succeeds on every level. I personally feel this is Cook’s best song to date (April 27, 2016). The song is about falling asleep to escape the day, and it sets the mood and the bar for the record extremely high. “Right Here, With You” is the “you and me against the world” story that Cook loves to tell. The track is very much a guitar driven track that we’ve heard a lot from Cook on past albums. Cook talks about how this is the first song where he did the lyrics through e-mail correspondence. I felt the song was an alright one, it’s one I liked a lot better on the first listens and the song impact has lessoned I’ve noticed over time. It’s a sort of the “radio friendly”, go-to single track I felt and am a little surprised it wasn’t. Not that I would have wanted it to be one but like I said, it sounds like the “radio friendly” go-to track, as it’s catchy, not too long, and easy on the ears. “We Believe” is a track that was inspired, says Cook, is a juxtaposition between his experience in Ethiopia and seeing Annie Lennox’s performance on Idol gives back. The song fades in from the end of “Right Here, With You”, and then hits with a steady kick drum beat. The chorus hits hard right from the words “We Believe”. Cook delivers a powerful performance on this song from his vocals, to the lyrics “In the power of hope/In the strength of peace/There’s a way back home/Where the battles seize”. The song is filled with inspirational lyrics and “we believe” everything Cook has to say with the song. The forth track, like David Cook, slows things down for the first ballad of the album. The track starts with a simple acoustic chord progression from the guitar. The chorus hits in the same vein as “Come Back To Me”, with the electric guitars and drums. The song is alright, it’s nothing that stands out much, though I should note the power vocals from Cook in the bridge are great. But other than that the song is just alright, it shouldn’t have been a single. “Hard To Believe” sort of came out of nowhere, I usually forget this song is on the album, and I don’t know why because its killer. This song begins with a haunting verse accompanied by a soft snare, a beautiful piano note progression and the lyrics “Stay, tell me the story again/How it all fell apart in the end”. The chorus, like most of Cook’s, hit hard. You hear the urgency, and hopelessness in Cook’s delivery. The song is speaks for itself and is one I feel could be fantastic live. “Take Me As I Am” is a song I always like better when I’m listening to it. What I mean by that is that it’s not one I turn my phone on to listen to like I do “Declaration” or “Circadian”, I usually don’t think too highly of the song, but once it’s on is usually when it opens my ears up a little more. The song is the next ballad on the album and Cook describes the song as having a sort of “I Don’t Want To Miss A Thing” feel to it, a statement that directly before saying it, Cook had stated that he’ll “probably shoot [himself] in the foot for this but…”. And I don’t really see the comparison, other than that they are both ballads. The song isn’t bad but it doesn’t stand out much at all, especially when it’s not being played. Where this song does lift off is on the EP This Quiet Night. It's so raw and is exactly where this song was supposed to sit sonically to me.

The second half of This Loud Morning starts with “Time Marches On”, maybe Cook’s worst song. The song starts of with potential, a steady guitar strum. But the song goes absolutely nowhere. The chorus doesn’t do anything and doesn’t compliment the verse at all. And one minute into the song, I’m already bored. There is nothing good that is memorable about this track. Very disappointing. The song could’ve been swapped for the unreleased “Make Believe” (where is this song – ugh!) or the bonus “Let Me Fall For You”. The song isn’t good at all. Skip it every time. Then we get the first single off of the album “The Last Goodbye”, a song co-written by OneRepublic’s Ryan Tedder. Lyrically the words don’t match the instrumental, which was Cook’s intent. Melodically the music is upbeat and “happy”, while the lyrics talk about the ending of a relationship. The song isn’t bad, and has a catchy enough chorus but wouldn’t have been my pick for a single. Although I can see why it did, with Ryan Tedder’s name attached and the catchy nature of the song, also it’s quite short runtime at 2 minutes and 59 seconds, the song has “radio friendly” written all over it. But overall it’s an alright little addition to the album, not one of my favourites but we do have a a great last quarter ahead. “Paper Heart”, after coming out of tracks 6-8, not only does track 9 give us a sigh of relief, but it knocks it out of the park. “Paper Heart” is one hell of a song. The song starts with a little riff that is all of a sudden supported by a drum and guitar beat. Cook sings his heart out on the track and one of the more “rocky” songs the album. The song would have made a perfect single, and I’m still unsure why it wasn’t. There’s not much more to say about the song, but 9 tracks in and there seems to be great potential for the end of the album. Now we get “4 Letter Word”, another track that wasn’t a stand out on the first listen through but picked up with each and every listen and has become a favourite on the album. The song is a sort of jaded view on love as it’s only a “4 letter word”. The chorus is a fun one, and the song feels like it could’ve been a track 9 or 10 on David Cook, I always feel like it was a song that didn’t get used on that album and showed up to this album, thankfully. It’s a little slower in tempo, but calls for it considering what the song is saying. “Goodbye To The Girl” feels like a call back to David Cook, and specifically “Permanent”, not really lyrically but melodically and how the song falls just before the final song on the album. The song is a piano driven ballad where Cook, again, sings his heart out. The lyrics are relentlessly chilling right from the opener “Paint another picture black and blue/Take another moment one or two, just to get over you”. The song talks about not knowing what to, feeling lost after a shortcoming personified through the loss of or ending of a relationship. With an even more chilling ending. The track is another great one. The album closer “Rapid Eye Movement” starts with a great little riff, quiet and soothing that turns into a full out rock riff, loud and powerful. The lyrics then kick in with “Give me one more quiet night/’Fore this loud morning gets it right/And does me in”. The same lyric where the album gets its name. The song is one that is notably a little different than what Cook has done before, yet again another call back to “A Daily AntheM” on David Cook, in that both end the record with a different take on the music. “Rapid Eye Movement” is the, sort of, brother to “Circadian”, where “Circadian” dealt with falling asleep to escape the day, “Rapid Eye Movement” deals with waking up again to deal with the loud reality we all have. The song is so powerful and is a definite stand out. The song also closes out with the same music that is heard at the beginning of “Circadian” to create a looped, “circadian rhythm”, feel to the album. And it works beautifully. The record, overall, swings and hits. Just another great album with some killer songs, another fantastic opener supported by an excellent closer. Something I thought I should note is the that the latest time I saw Cook perform live (March 2016) he only played one song, “Paper Heart”, from This Loud Morning, while playing much more off of his last David Cook and latest Digital Vein The album does not leave fans empty handed. It has it’s weaker moments with songs like “Take Me As I Am” and “Time Marches On”, as did the first record but I think these lows hit a little lower than the first. But I believe the highs hit higher with songs like “Circadian”, “Paper Heart”, and “Rapid Eye Movement”. Both albums follow the same guitar driven sounding music but there is notable expansions in Cook’s range as a songwriter, lyricist and musician. Order of songs from favourite (1) to least favourite (12):