A Gateway Hypothesis of Silverstein - Arrivals and Departures

I won’t lie to you all, this is a grim time to be alive. The lockdown is still in place, the coronavirus is still causing us a lot of havoc, our world is controlled by politicians who despite best intentions aren’t making things better, and our usual day to day lives have been put on hold for a considerably long time now. With all of this in mind, when deciding on what to review this week, I wanted to talk about something that had some correlation to mental health. I looked back into my past to think about an album that I personally relate to on an emotional level. One which had encouraged me to explore, think through, and talk through my feelings more openly. And for me that album was ‘Arrivals and Departures’ by Silverstein.

While Silverstein was not my first example of Heavy Rock from the early 2000s, the Canadian Post-Hardcore band was my first glimpse into heavier, more Screamo orientated music, and ‘Arrivals and Departures’ was the very first album I’d heard by the band all the way through. It would continue to be a personal favourite for me, not only as an awesome record, but also an abundant influence for my creativity, and an extra bonding point for myself and my older brother on car journeys. For a long time, I thought very highly of this album. So, you can imagine my surprise when I realised that not everyone felt the same way about it. And that’s what I want to talk about today.

So let’s get into that a bit shall we? After doing some personal research on this album through a variety of different sources, there’s actually a lot to the story of why people don’t think this release entirely works. From the perspective of the fan base, a big part of the dislike for ‘Arrivals and Departures’ comes down to the fact that this album displays a very different musical tone for the band to use. Especially when you compare it to their more popular releases. Silverstein’s second and by far most popular album, ‘Discovering The Waterfront’ has been held up in the early 2000s as one of the best examples of Post-Hardcore music to date, and I quite agree with that statement. Especially when you consider that so many of the band’s hardcore fans became so upon hearing it. ‘Arrivals and Departures’ on the other hand is rather different. While not a bad example of the band’s music, songs from this third studio release trade in the more Screamo inclined surges of Silverstein’s earlier career, for something more Rock inspired. Something a bit more simple and perhaps under-developed?

Fans from all generations have been quick to claim that ‘Arrivals and Departures’ is probably their least favourite from the band’s discography, and it’s easy to see why this might be just by simply listening to the differences in tone. But this mild dislike is also felt by the band members themselves! While initially, Silverstein claimed that they were going for a Rock album vibe that not many fans would get, revisionism has allowed the band to look back on this a bit more objectively. Some people have assumed that the band members dislike ‘Arrivals and Departures’ due to past personal issues, but more recently frontman, Shane Told confessed that another reason this album wasn’t a favourite was due to the process of creating it. Supposedly it was a difficult time for the members, and the process of putting this album together was a lot more challenging. They found it harder to draw on their personal times for good, solid influence and I suppose they just wanted to get it done quickly. You could potentially dig deeper into these stories to find more, but overall and more generally, there seems to be this understanding for fans and band members alike. ‘Arrivals and Departures’ was not the best album Silverstein ever made.

But despite this, there is actually a fair chunk of fans that love this album. And I think that poses a very interesting question. We all know why people might not consider this album a favourite, but then why are there fans who do like it?

I think the best way to begin answering this question would be by returning to the idea of musical tone. As discussed before, ‘Arrivals and Departures’ has a very different tone to it’s more bleeding predecessor ‘Discovering The Waterfront’. It’s also rather different from the following fourth studio album, ‘A Shipwreck in the Sand’ which makes more use of Melodic Metalcore. In comparison to an album that’s more emotionally brutal, and another one which has more of a narrative perspective, ‘Arrivals and Departures’ tends to come across less impactful and scarring, but more straightforward and potentially more broody.

The song structures are a bit more generic than past and future ones, going for a typical verse, chorus, verse, chorus, bridge, chorus format. These structures will usually be set apart with softer instrumental intros, guitar solos in between structures, and heavy emphasis on using screamed vocals during the bridges, more than lacing them in with singing during verses and choruses. Of course, there are some songs that are an exception to this rule such as ‘If You Could See Into My Soul’ and ‘Worlds Apart’. But these rules within these structures create a music subsect that’s more amenable and easier to listen to, especially when paired with riffs, rhythms, and beats which are quite simple. The songs give us a sense more of ‘Let’s get down to business and get this over with’ rather than, ‘Let’s make this the best it can be and have it say something about something’.

Going back to the instrumentation and genres used in this album, we have something that’s a bit more synonymous with Heavy Rock music, as well as solos and riffs which reflect a Glam Metal feel. Good examples of this might include ‘Bodies And Words’ and ‘True Romance’. While these aren’t necessarily bad influences to be working with, in the case of this album it leads to music which is a bit too basic, and without being rude, unimaginative. Part of Silverstein’s appeal is that their general style allows them to explore small themes of experimentation and edges within very catchy, racing music. And the songs on ‘Arrivals and Departure’ are indeed catchy but lack some of the edges that would keep us interested. We have an album which, in comparison to other works by this band is slightly watered down. Despite this, I do feel that songs ‘My Disaster’ and ‘Vanity and Greed’ are a personal exception to this. Both songs either have a darker edge to them or have more interesting features in their structure.

So if we were to get any sort of conclusion from looking at this album’s tone, it would be that ‘Arrivals and Departures’ is simple and catchy, but quite unadventurous. But then what does that mean in the grand scheme of our question? Well, it’s mainly this. Despite being an album which takes less risks, it’s also an album that’s easier to listen to. Hold onto that thought, because I'll come back to it in a minute.

Just for a moment, Let’s go back in time and talk about the year 2007. It’s a point within the early 2000s where Post-Hardcore, Emo and Screamo music was more popularly recognised. You’ve got lots of big names and lots of smaller names that are doing very nicely due to the rise in popularity of their chosen styles. But something that’s really interesting about this style is that ever since its invention, it’s been an open, smooth canvas that can be worked and reworked into something different. By the early 2000’s you have an abundance of bands who are mixing Post-Hardcore and Emo with other styles. Paramore, Fall Out Boy, and Panic! At The Disco have Emo Pop. Groups like Taking Back Sunday, The Used and My Chemical Romance throw Alternative Rock into the mix. Other bands like Chiodos and The Fall Of Troy experiment with Progressive elements. But around the time of 2006, there are new types of bands that are playing around with Post-Hardcore. Except these bands are going for something heavier. Suddenly with bands like A Day To Remember, Alesana, and Black Veil Brides, we get more influences from Heavy metal and Metalcore thrown in. And this new style catches fire. It gets soaked up into the mainstream of Rock music within a few short years, and with its rise in popularity, it begins to obscure it’s more Emo predecessor. But despite all of this, let’s say that you’re a music fan who needed a bit more convincing before getting into this new wave of bands. You want an album that’s got screamed vocals and heavy parts, but that’s easy to listen to and not such a task. Something that would help you to get comfortable with heavier music. Something like… ‘Arrivals and Departures’ by Silverstein. And this is where I think we have a possible answer to our question.

I think that for many fans, ‘Arrivals and Departures’ was a gateway album not only into Silverstein, but into heavier music in general. Now this is just my hypothesis, and I can’t generalise this idea with every Silverstein fan from this time period. But I mean, that’s how it happened for me. It was after listening to ‘Arrivals and Departures’ that I began to explore heavier music properly. Despite originally perceiving it as a rather scary, screamy album, it was very accessible and easy to follow. And if someone was capable of enjoying a slightly heavier album like this, then what would stop them from enjoying music that’s even heavier? As far as I can see, there’s definitely a connection there. It does make sense if you consider how many Silverstein fans came to the party during 2007 when the album was released.

But then again, I could be utterly, stupidly wrong here. There could be a thousand different reasons why someone likes or dislikes an album. As I said before, a big reason I still love it so much is because it relates very heavily to my past, as well as how my tastes in music would progress. It was something that brought me and my older brother together. My copy of ‘Arrivals and Departures’ was originally one of his own CDs, and I still have it to this day. My brother had a huge impact and influence on my music tastes growing up and ‘Arrivals and Departures’ is one of the most prominent examples of that. But, listening to it now after such a long time, it is easy to see what everyone is talking about. And I’ll admit, this album is probably the weakest Silverstein ever recorded. It’s not the heaviest, and it’s certainly not the most creative. But for me, and perhaps for many other fans, it does carry a lot of emotional importance and good memories. And that alone holds it up as something worthwhile. It may not have been the first, it definitely won’t be the last, but it has certainly been the most definitive.

So, for the album ‘Arrivals and Departures’ I will give Silverstein a 6.5/10. While not the best album out there, it may very well hold more importance to an individual than we first see. Despite what I’ve said, if you are wanting to get into heavier music I would recommend giving this album a try, just to see how you get on. Don’t let its reputation scare you off.

Anyway I hope you enjoyed this review. I tried to go for something a little bit different with this one to keep the writing fresh and interesting. But chances are I’ll probably try different angles and ways of writing as I continue. I may also write more reviews about bands I've covered before, but explore more of their previous releases, as I'm such a sucker for the 2000’s era.

But don’t worry, next week I’ll be writing about something more recent and fresh. Now if only I could figure out what it’ll be, haha. Until then, I'll see you next week