Logo
DiS Needs You: Save our site »
  • Logo_home2
  • Records
  • In Depth
  • In Photos
  • Blog
  • Podcast
  • Search
  • Community
  • Records
  • In Depth
  • Blog
  • Community

THIS SITE HAS BEEN ARCHIVED AND CLOSED.

Please join the conversation over on our new forums »

If you really want to read this, try using The Internet Archive.

Aiden

Conviction

Label: Victory Records Release Date: 20/08/2007

27283
charlesubaghs by Charles Ubaghs September 10th, 2007

Sonic Youth’s Kim Gordon recently said in an interview, “At any given time, there are levels and degrees of what’s commercial. Emo shows that, with whiney-voiced men making money off the fact that they’re baring their souls, when of course, they’re not”.

Cast your eyes over Seattle’s* Aiden *and you’ll find five young men who, with their well-placed tattoos, a healthy dose of eyeliner and a love of sharing their emotions via the time-honoured route of lyrical clichés (“I will wait for this moment / when our lips collide / it almost stopped the earth…”), look and sound like they’ve just stepped off the mass production line of the modern day American emo factory that Gordon rightfully derides.

All of this, of course, begs the question: is this really what’s become of a North American punk(ish) scene that once had roots in early hardcore and eventually thrust a band like At The Drive-In into the eyes of the mainstream for an all-too-brief spell? Apparently yes if you take a look at its current popularity in the States.

The five sensitive punks in Aiden are making their mark on the scene by claiming to play a mix of rock, goth and punk mired in dark emotions and writing things like “Hell is a nice place to visit” on their MySpace to prove their point. Frontman wiL Francis even goes as far as saying that new album Conviction is “about loving the darkness that will destroy you, it’s about tearing yourself apart from inside”.

It’s all quite deep and profound stuff from the sound of it, yet press play on Conviction and what you find is a worn-out collection of plodding, heard-it-all-before tunes. Songs like ‘Teenage Queen’, ‘Hurt Me’ and ‘She Will Love You’ take a shallow stab at expressing the ‘inner darkness’, but they’re nothing more than mildly laughable numbers best left heard in the background at retail outlets of US mall goth/punk outfitters Hot Topic. And no matter how often this band play off their goth-obsessed punk credentials, all they prove with Conviction is that they’re second tier members of a new poodle rock scene – albeit one that prefers black hair dye to hair spray and would rather regale us with middling diary entries instead of Jack Daniels-fuelled tales of late night debauchery.

If there’s one fact about Conviction that’s sure to bring a tear to the eye though, it’s this: these boys are likely to sell a lot of records. Tragic, isn’t it?

  • 1
    Charles Ubaghs's Score
Log-in to rate this record out of 10
Share on
   
Love DiS? Become a Patron of the site here »


LATEST


  • Why Music Journalism Matters in 2024


  • Drowned in Sound is back!


  • Drowned in Sound's 21 Favourite Albums of the Year: 2020


  • Drowned in Sound to return as a weekly newsletter


  • Lykke Li's Sadness Is A Blessing


  • Glastonbury 2019 preview playlist + ten alternative must sees



Left-arrow

Ratatat at Barcelona, Spain Sala Razzmatazz, Fri 31 Aug

Mobback
27278
27282

Animal Collective

Strawberry Jam

Mobforward
Right-arrow


LATEST

    news


    Why Music Journalism Matters in 2024

  • 106145
  • news


    Drowned in Sound is back!

  • 106143

    news


    Drowned in Sound's 21 Favourite Albums of the Y...

  • 106141
  • news


    Drowned in Sound to return as a weekly newsletter

  • 106139

    Playlist


    Lykke Li's Sadness Is A Blessing

  • 106138
  • Festival Preview


    Glastonbury 2019 preview playlist + ten alterna...

  • 106137

    Interview


    A Different Kind Of Weird: dEUS on The Ideal Crash

  • 106136
  • Festival Review


    Way Out East: DiS Does Sharpe Festival 2019

  • 106135
MORE


    news


    The Neptune Music Prize 2016 - Vote Now

  • 103918
  • Takeover


    The Winner Takes It All

  • 50972

    Takeover


    10 Things To Not Expect Your Record Producer To...

  • 93724
  • review


    The Mars Volta - Deloused In The Comatorium

  • 4317

    review


    Sonic Youth - Nurse

  • 6044
  • feature


    New Emo Goth Danger? My Chemical Romance confro...

  • 89578

    feature


    DiS meets Justice

  • 27270
  • news


    Our Independent music filled alternative to New...

  • 104374
MORE

Drowned in Sound
  • DROWNED IN SOUND
  • HOME
  • SITE MAP
  • NEWS
  • IN DEPTH
  • IN PHOTOS
  • RECORDS
  • RECOMMENDED RECORDS
  • ALBUMS OF THE YEAR
  • FESTIVAL COVERAGE
  • COMMUNITY
  • MUSIC FORUM
  • SOCIAL BOARD
  • REPORT ERRORS
  • CONTACT US
  • JOIN OUR MAILING LIST
  • FOLLOW DiS
  • GOOGLE+
  • FACEBOOK
  • TWITTER
  • SHUFFLER
  • TUMBLR
  • YOUTUBE
  • RSS FEED
  • RSS EMAIL SUBSCRIBE
  • MISC
  • TERM OF USE
  • PRIVACY
  • ADVERTISING
  • OUR WIKIPEDIA
© 2000-2025 DROWNED IN SOUND