Album Review: Jonas Brothers – The Album
2 min read
When you think of mid-2000s boybands, one that comes to mind almost immediately is the Jonas Brothers. The group saw worldwide success through Disney, having a string of hits before going their separate ways in 2010. Apart, each brother saw major success, the most notable being Nick Jonas’s solo career, and Joe Jonas’s second band DNCE. In 2019, they returned to working together, and now after dabbling in their other projects once again, they have returned with their sixth album.
Miracle opens with a peppy synth line that screams summer. The funky nature of the production suits the brother’s gritty yet high voices, and they lean into this ascetic well. Electric keys, percussive guitar lines, and later the high strings create a heavenly introduction. Following track Montana Sky embraces the groups natural talent for harmonies. The backing floats almost artificially over the top of the choruses, and is backed by interesting effects and a catchy melody. Single Wings breezes past, while Sail Away continues that calmness in its spacious production, complete with shakers and bongos. Celebrate! brings in the trumpets, as well as a choir, capturing the infectious anthemic tone that it sets out to get.
Vacation Eyes and Summer In The Hamptons bring the tempo down, the former being an 80s-tinged ballad, and the latter stripping back the instrumentation, managing to keep the momentum going with acoustic guitars and warped backing vocals without turning the volume up. Summer Baby is the closest the brothers come to sounding like their old selves, the boy-band harmonies, bouncy rhyme, and long fade out at the end capturing a youthful energy.
Final track Walls, featuring singer-songwriter Jon Bellion, begins, aptly, with a wall of organ, before transitioning into harmonised, attuned vocals and acoustic guitars. The final half of the song is a brash build of sound effects and drums, part futuristic, part gospel. It’s an intriguing finish, but shows a creative flare.
Despite its reductive title, The Album is a fun time, comprising of crisply produced funk tracks and interesting pop songs. When the brothers come together it’s undeniable that they have an inbuilt talent for harmony, and the back and forth between verses is always enjoyable. Its a concise thirty minute pop banger, worth listening to whether you’re a fan of the brother’s previous music or not.
Writer and Musician, Ryan Bulbeck has been published with a number of online publications, and has worked with a myriad of great artists, both as a performer, and as a producer. His most recent band The 295 are still active, playing shows around the UK.
