album of the week: 1.5

Incubus

If Not Now, When?

(2011)

why you'll love it: Incubus embraces "soft rock" like they should have years ago

why you'll hate it: too little too late. Still has bad lyrics

Today is last of the 11's (I think), and I saved this review for the the album that I held off on the longest. I was scared of hearing this one. Everything I read about this album seemed to prepare me for a disaster. Even the title annoys the hell out of me. If Not Now, When? How about 10 years ago when you were last relevant? If nobody is listening anymore, you can't pretend what you are doing is a big deal? Also, how is making a soft album a bold move, after watering down your sound was what got you your big break?

What annoys me even more is that this really is the album they should have done over ten years ago. Flash back to me as a teenager. I saw Incubus' music video for "A Certain Shade of Green" on some random fledging not-MTV music network. I became an instant fan. I didn't know they were basically being Mr. Bungle. To me, Incubus was the wildest, most innovative, and unpredictable band out there. S.C.I.E.N.C.E. (1997) is still an awesome album today. I rushed to my local record store after school in 1999 to buy their next album, Make Yourself . I still remember sitting on the curb outside the mall with my portable CD player and my shoulders slumped. Make Yourself is generic wishy-washy mainstream radio garbage. I did then, and still to this day hate every song on it, and cannot figure out how it put Incubus on the map.

If Not Now isn't all that good either. Brandon Boyd's lyrics are still cliched and awkward, and nothing really stands out; but it does something that Incubus' money-maker albums (Make Yourself & Morning View (2001)) didn't. It goes for it. It is a dedicated soft and slow paced album. It doesn't feel like they compromised anything, but made deliberate shift. The teenager version of me probably would have still hated it, but now that I'm older, I kind of respect risks like that. I'd much rather this had been the album that put Incubus on the map than Make Yourself. Instead this will probably be the release that they fade away with.