Ghxst Pul$e

Reviewed by TenTillDeath:

Two teenagers from California looking to both revive and revitalize a scene of music that was relevant in the 2010s known as the emo SoundCloud wave. Does this album successfully help the duo revitalize a long forgotten genre?

Everybody Is The Same is the sophomore release to their first album, Worst Case Scenario. Compared to their previous work, the mixing is the best work they’ve had up to this point; in fact, for independent artists, the mixing is a little too good. The instrumental selections sound similar to each other with very atmospheric elements mixed with guitars that convey sadness. The continuity with the instrumentals following very close to eachother in sound makes every track belong with eachother on this album.

Songs such as Softly Please, Right Push (Wrong Direction), Body Bag, and the interlude tend to be the Ghxst Pulse at their most unique and catchiness. In fact, it’s nearly criminal that these songs are the most pleasing sounding yet are buried deep in the album. And this is a problem that Ghxst Pul$e suffers from.

The interlude almost sounds like an album intro, so the question is, why is it an interlude instead of an intro. The interlude sets a sad tone for the album, which the entire album’s mood conveys. It’s criminal that the duo would use this interlude that’s a reference to the Batman comics as an interlude instead of an album intro. It’s even more criminal that Ghxst Pul$e would hide their most unique, and best songs this album has to offer at a midway point in the album instead of at the beginning as most artists do. These songs are so different from the rest of the album, that the rest of the songs on the album just sound like a repeat of eachother…and that’s the problem.

Almost every song with the exception of the ones I’ve mentioned sound like recreations of each other. It’s as if Ghxst Pul$e decided that they would just remake the same song over and over again. It also doesn’t help that these songs are almost lyrically identical in their substance about girls, love, and heartbreak. Listen to every song with the exceptions of the ones I mentioned above and ask yourself if they don’t just sound like the same song, different track. In fact, this is what hurts the album the most. By the time that you get to the songs at the mid point of the album that are actually listening to, you’re probably about to put down the album and not listen to it again from how repetitive it gets. You know it’s bad when the featured artist V4mpgod is a breathe of fresh air up to this point in the album; in fact, they out perform Ghxst Pul$e on their own album.

The worst part about this album is the overlayering of vocals. Though the duo are both present on their album, it’s almost impossible at times to tell who’s singing since the overlayering of vocals makes them sound too similar. It also doesn’t help that both artists in the duo have a similar song cadence as well. This overlayering makes it hard to truly understand what Ghxst Pul$e are even saying at times. One gripe about this overlayering of vocals is that at points when you’re expecting the duo to hit high notes, instead you’re presented with flat overlayered vocals at times when there should have been high notes being hit.

I personally would have made this album an EP and put the tracks in this order. Make the interlude the intro,  Softly Please the second track, Body Bag the third, and end it with Right Push (Wrong Direction). I believe if Ghxst Pul$e did it this way, they would have had a near outstanding EP that would have been met with highly critical reception.

We here at the Record Ranters believe this album is a two out of five stars. Ghxst Pul$e has great mixing in their songs and unique ideas that shine at the album’s midpoint; however, the repetitiveness of the majority of songs and overlayering will cause listeners to tune out before they can get to the album’s actual substance.

Watch our video review about the album below