First Impressions | A Day To Remember Big Ole Album: Vol 1
A lack of memorable songs and authenticity sadly make this album one not to remember
Surprise releases are, well, surprising. Artists such as Taylor Swift and Beyonce have whipped their fans into a frenzy by dropping albums with zero warning. In the world of rock, Avenged Sevenfold dropped The Stage spontaneously to great critical acclaim and a #4 debut on Billboard 200. It was only a matter of if, not when, we’d get a surprise album from another major act in the scene, and this time it was A Day To Remember. But will this album be one to remember, or one that leaves you homesick for their older material?
Big Ole Album: Volume 1 is A Day To Remember’s eighth full length album and first since 2021’s You’re Welcome. The band also released the physical version of the album first, with the streaming version not available until March 21st 2025. A Day To Remember have had quite the highs and lows throughout their career. Their four album run of For Those Who Have Heart, Homesick, What Separates Me From You, and Common Courtesy is enough to make any band weep with envy. They were THE band of the early 2010s. Fun live shows, memorable songs, likeable bandmembers, heavy breakdowns, they really were the band where there was something for everyone. At one point they were even arguments to be made they were going to take the torch from Blink-182 for alternative music.
However, A Day To Remember has stuttered a bit from the mid 2010s onward. After releasing the good but not great Bad Vibrations in 2016, the band announced their signing with Fueled By Ramen (FBR) who for context also have Paramore on their label. A Day To Remember was supposed to release a new album through FBR in late 2019. This eventually turned into 2020. And then 2021. Finally, after years of waiting fans were greeted with You’re Welcome.
And it was not good. To add insult to injury, a few months later their longtime bassist Joshua Woodard left in quite an unceremonious fashion after years of allegations (as well as a fatal car accident with his involvement).
With that being said, the band has still found success in the live space. When I went to their summer tour last year it was packed to the gills and the crowd didn’t stand still all night. This has lead to A Day To Remember surprise dropping this new album, their first in four years.
A Day To Remember have never been shy from embracing either their metal or pop punk side and this album is no exception. The album opens up with a hard rock style track “Make It Make Sense.” And the big elephant about the heavy songs on this album is apparent. A Day To Remember are going through an identity crisis. Every heavy song sounds like a different band, but not like A Day To Remember. “Make it Make Sense” sounds like a Wage War or I Prevail song. And wouldn’t ya know, one of the main songwriters and producers on this album is none other than Wage War’s guitarist Cody Quistad. And then “Silence” straight up sounds like a Gojira ripoff. It’s really unfortunate, these songs all sound like decent ideas that got brought up at band practice only for the execution to be missed. I can’t tell what they’re trying to go for and with each heavy song on the album it sounds like there’s boxes being checked rather than the organic chaos the old albums brought to the table.
There’s another glaring weakness that grips a majority of the songs on this album, and that’s the lyrics. Generally for me personally lyrics are the least important element of a metalcore album. Usually they’re just another instrument. But when they’re really good or really bad, that’s when I notice. And lyrically, this album is not good. “Feedback” and “Bad Blood” in particular have some of the worst lyrics in their discography. And to add insult to injury there is actually the most annoying song they’ve ever written. “Die For Me.” It wouldn’t be a bad song, but the vocal editing is particularly atrocious. And then during the chorus, there’s a “me, me, ME, ME” vocal sound that is just awful. It’s on the same level as the infamous TEE HEE in the Suicide Silence track “Doris” TEE HEE in terms of one sound ruining the song. How many people did that make it past?
This may be delusional of me to say, but I don’t put 100% of the blame of this album’s issues on A Day To Remember. In my opinion Fueled By Ramen has something to answer for. You’re Welcome’s delays and issues were one thing, this is now the second album in a row where the final result has been disappointing. Labels have a lot more influence than we as fans tend to realize. It’s easy to put the blame on the guys onstage, but there’s a lot more behind the curtain.
I’ve been doing nothing shitting on the album so I’m going to finish off by talking about the songs I did enjoy. “Flowers” is a heartfelt track that sounds like it was straight taken off of Homesick or What Separates Me From You. “LeBron” is a catchy tune with one of their best choruses in years. For my favorite heavy track, it’s “To The Death”. The energy on it feels organic unlike the other heavy tracks, and sounds like it would be fun song to hear live. The three year old song “Miracle” and the closing track on the album “Closer Than You Think” are also quite good. They both sound like the A Day To Remember evolution that we need. More of those, less of “me, me, ME, ME”.
In 2025, A Day To Remember does not appear to have an idea of what to base their identity around. I really, really wanted to love this album. This was the first physical album I’ve bought in years due to the surprise release nature. But unfortunately songs that sound like other bands, horrible lyrics, overreliance on vocal editing, and shoehorning of old singles bring this album down. If Vol. 2 is like this, I wonder if they should’ve just taken the best songs from each album and made one great album. But alas, I think Fueled By Ramen is pulling more strings than we’re being lead to believe. But if that’s not the case, then I can confidently say that the band I loved growing up is going through an identity crisis that may not be fixable.
Anyways see you guys in the pit next time they come to town.
Final Rating- 5/10
Favorite Tracks- “Flowers” and “LeBron”
FFO- Wage War, I Prevail, All Time Low