WHEN THE SWEET TURNS SOUR

This album is a collection of demos, alternate takes, live tracks and such, released by Echolyn after the band appeared to be broken up for good (thankfully that wasn't so) after getting screwed by those wonderful people at Sony. As such, you can expect it to be uneven. But since this is Echolyn, although it is uneven, it is highly entertaining.

I've always preferred the more high energy songs from this band over the low key, and, thankfully, nearly all of this collection fits that description. The only low key songs are Meaning And The Moment an alternate version, but not as good as the track from the debut album, and Where The Sour Turns To Sweet a cover, and improvement to a song from Genesis' first album.

Most of the songs do not sound as polished as the ones on the official studio albums, but there is still that Echolyn style of writing and arranging, that shows intricate interplay between all of the instruments and vocal parts. And don't miss the two live tracks at the end, either.