It Won't Be Soon Before Long

告示牌、AMG网站4颗半星 超高评价鉴赏 葛莱美最佳流行乐团睽违五年万众期待魔力大碟  空降全美专辑榜销售冠军 iTunes网络专辑及单曲下载排行双冠王   2002年，Adam Levine[主唱/吉他]与洛杉矶高校同窗Jesse Carmichael[键盘]、Mickey Madden[贝斯]、James Valentine[吉他]，以Adam对前任女友的种种爱恋感受写成一缸子的歌，这些歌后来变成了魔力红(Maroon 5)的首张大碟『Songs About Jane』，这张专辑缔造全球超过1000万张销售纪录，更抱走葛莱美奖、Billboard音乐奖、MTV音乐录像带大奖等6项乐坛大奖，全球乐坛瞬间成为魔力红施展魔力的最佳舞台。2008年，魔力红再度以他们的全新专辑【It Won’t Be Soon Before Long】入围葛莱美奖，并成功夺下最佳流行乐团大奖肯定，将乐团声势带到最高峰。   这张魔力红的全新大碟【It Won’t Be Soon Before Long】，Adam表示「这是一张以我们之前所打造的那种与众不同的创作风格为根基，然后在整体乐风呈现上较前作来得更加性感迷人，更加强烈震撼，甚至在歌曲表现上都显得份外深层晦暗的作品」。魔力红在2005年于美国幻术大师胡迪尼传说中坐落在洛杉矶Laurel Canyon的故居所改建的录音室中，与制作老搭档Jason Lader开始酝酿【It Won’t Be Soon Before Long】中的歌曲，随后再转往洛杉矶其他录音室继续创作，整个专辑的创作与录音制作为期近两年。专辑邀请Mike Elizondo (Fiona Apple、Eminem)、Mark “Spike” Stent (Gwen Stefani、Bjork、Keane、Marilyn Manson)、Mark Endert (Madonna)、Eric Valentine (Queens Of The Stone Age)等跨越流行、摇滚、嘻哈等领域的制作豪杰共同效力制作，而新加入的鼓手Matt Flynn更为乐团带来益发强悍的摇滚劲道。   首支单曲“Makes Me Wonder”的整体流行摇滚音乐线条点出了魔力红在新专辑中向70、80年代经典摇滚致敬的意味，这首单曲挟着全美电台超强点播率与网络下载效应，在一周之内从热门单曲榜第64名直接夺冠，惊创全美排行榜史上单周窜升名次最多的冠军单曲纪录，更在全球9国排行榜进驻TOP10。第2首单曲“Wake Up Call”中，曲风融合流行摇滚与嘻哈，Adam的唱腔将嘻哈音乐中常见的呛声唱法转化成愤怒情绪的宣泄。让嘻哈与摇滚的强悍性格猛烈撞击的歌曲“Little Of Your Time”则触及情感关系中的不信任感。以震撼的吉他音色搭配利落节奏而成的开场曲“If I Never See Your Face Again”颇有向音乐名匠Quincy Jones致敬之意。   It Won't Be Soon Before Long is Maroon 5's second studio album, released on May 22, 2007. The name was inspired by a phrase the band adopted to keep themselves motivated while on their tour. The album debuted at number one on the U.S. Billboard 200, selling around 430,000 copies in its first week and, as of 2011, approximately 5 million copies worldwide. Former drummer Ryan Dusick has credited as "Musical Director". It Won't Be Soon Before Long has 12 songs, plus 6 bonus tracks. The band stated in interviews that the album has a different feel to it from the Songs About Jane. The songs are not all based on one specific relationship, as in Jane; and also have a different sound than their first album, being more electric and drawing inspiration from such artists as the Talking Heads, Michael Jackson and Prince. A review written prior to the album's release described the songs as having a very retro feel. Adam Levine explained that this record is a little more self-confident and powerful lyrically: "...you can dance to it, there's a little more attitude." According to Levine working with other artists had influences on the album: "Kanye West and Alicia Keys are amazing talents, in totally different ways. Just seeing such amazing people working in the studio. I definitely took things away from them." The chorus of "Nothing Lasts Forever" is the same used in the Kanye West single "Heard 'Em Say", which features Adam Levine with exclusion to the line, "...the distance between us makes it so hard to stay..." The song has also featured in a trailer for the movie Definitely, Maybe. Initial critical response to It Won't Be Soon Before Long was positive. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the album has received an average score of 66, based on 14 reviews. Allmusic rated the album 4.5 stars out of 5, commenting that the production of the album "is so immaculate that it glistens". Billboard rated it 4.5 stars. This album was #32 on Rolling Stone's list of the Top 50 Albums of 2007. (wiki) ------------------------------------------------------------------ by Stephen Thomas Erlewine Maroon 5's 2002 debut album, Songs About Jane, was the kind of hit that doesn't happen often in the new millennium -- a genuine word-of-mouth hit whose popularity grew steadily after its release, largely due to the sweet, sunny hit "This Love," a song sly and catchy enough to stay on the adult pop charts for years without wearing out its welcome. It also was catchy enough to engender years of goodwill. Five years of goodwill, in fact, as the band toured heavily while slowly tinkering away on their second album, finally delivering It Won't Be Soon Before Long (its title perhaps a pun on the gap between records, perhaps not) half a decade after Songs About Jane. If that delay sounds like a symptom of sophomore jitters, that's not exactly true, since during that long stretch between albums Maroon 5 worked Songs About Jane and, in a sense, that album wasn't strictly their first album, either. Maroon 5 evolved out of Kara's Flowers, a post-grunge pop band whose 1997 debut never took off, not even when their debut was reissued in the wake of Maroon's success, but it did provide the group with the foundation for their success; it's where they paid their dues and learned how to be a pop band. Traces of Kara's Flowers could be heard in Maroon's rockier moments on their debut, but under their new name, the group began to develop an infatuation with blue-eyed soul-pop, which they wisely develop on It Won't Be Soon Before Long. More than develop, they modernize it, borrowing elements of Justin Timberlake's stylized synthesized soul, but Adam Levine is wise enough to know that he's no young colt, like JT. He knows that he's a pop guy, somewhat in the tradition of Hall & Oates, but he isn't trying to be retro, he's trying to fill that void, making records that are melodic, stylish, and soulful, which It Won't Be Soon Before Long certainly is. In every respect, It Won't Be Soon is a bigger album than its predecessor: hooks pile up one after another, there's not an ounce of fat on the songs, the production is so immaculate that it glistens. If there were lingering elements of Maroon 5's alt-rock past on Songs About Jane -- primarily in its lazy, hazy vibe -- they're gone now, replaced by the sleek, assured sound of a band that's eager to embrace its status as the big American mainstream pop band of the decade. But Maroon 5 isn't desperately grasping at the brass ring, they're playing it smart, building upon the core strengths of their debut and crafting a record that's designed to appeal to many different listeners, from teens crushing on Nelly Furtado's R&B makeover to adults looking for something smooth and melodic. It Won't Be Soon Before Long appeals to both audiences with an ease that seems effortless, but like any modern blockbuster, this album was shepherded by several different teams of producers, all brought in to emphasize a different personality within the group. The bulk of the record was cut with Spike Stent and Mike Elizondo -- Stent worked with U2, Oasis, Björk, and Gwen Stefani, while Elizondo had produced Fiona Apple and Pink -- but Queens of the Stone Age producer Eric Valentine was brought in for a couple of cuts, as was Mark Endert, who mixed "This Love." There may have been three different sets of producers, but the album is streamlined and seamless, never seeming calculated even if it was clearly made with an eye on mass appeal, and there are two reasons for that. First, Maroon 5 has gelled as a band, developing a clean, crisp attack that may bear traces of its influences -- there are knowing references to Prince, the Police, even OutKast sprinkled throughout (the keyboard on "Little of Your Time" is a direct nod to "Hey Ya") -- but it's a sound that's instantly identifiable as the band's own signature. Nowhere is that more evident than in how they can give soulful grooves like "If I Never See Your Face Again" a rock edge -- or how they can suddenly explode into shards of noise as they do on the coda of "Kiwi" -- or how when the electronic instruments dominate the production, the music still breathes like the work of an actual band, not like something that was constructed on a computer. But like with any good blue-eyed soul, the reason that this album works is the songs themselves. Even the flashiest production-driven tracks here -- the opening one-two punch of "If I Never See Your Face Again" and "Makes Me Wonder" -- aren't about feel; they're about the songs, which are uniformly tight and tuneful, sounding better with repeated plays, the way any radio-oriented pop should. If some of the ballads aren't as distinguished as the livelier tracks, they nevertheless are as sharply crafted as the rest, and the end result is that It Won't Be Soon Before Long is that rare self-stylized blockbuster album that sounds as big and satisfying as was intended.