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Timeflies: After Hours

Good music is like a good slice of chocolate cake; it melts into your taste buds with every bite, forcing you to wonder how many times you can ingest it without growing tired of it or feeling guilty.

Unfortunately, Timeflies’ sophomore-but-somehow-debut album makes me feel guilty.

Timeflies is clearly following the popular trend set by Avicii , David Guetta and Calvin Harris since 2011. But where these producers got it right, Timeflies got it wrong.

The key components that made Avicii’s “Hey Brother” and David Guetta’s “Titanium” so successful were the soft and meaningful verses that gradually shifted into a loud, powerful chorus that invoked dancing but also made you feel something.

On “After Hours,” the riffs are bland, the melodies are uninspired and the lyrics are annoyingly repetitive. Take “Swoon” for instance, where the chorus goes, “Yeah lemme see ya swoon/ we could set it off make the bass go boom/ Do it so fly I could take you to the moon”.

Even listening to “Somebody Gon’ Get it” with T-Pain’s signature Auto-Tune laced throughout the song, I could not shake the feeling that I had heard the song before. It’s obvious that there is almost nothing to distinguish one track from another.

Timeflies likes to mix heavy synthesizers with larger-than-life choruses. And it’s just too much. Their leading single, “All the Way,” starts with a harsh guitar strum, causing the song to progress too quickly. The chorus sounds busy and intense.

This wouldn’t be a problem if the intensity didn’t stay there for the rest of the song. But honestly, what can we really expect from a duo that has literally built a reputation on mash-ups and covers?

This is clearly marketed for the teenage party girl. “After Hours” does nothing to shine a positive light on the pop genre and should only be bought if you want to dance. I’m not sure what Timeflies intended to demonstrate on this album.

Whatever it is, Cobra Starship did it five years ago, and they did it better.

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