Boyce Avenue: Acoustic Sessions

Artist: Boyce Avenue
Title: Acoustic Sessions 1-4
Genre: Pop/Hip-Hop Covers

Track List: (Too many to list, click Preview below)

Boyce Avenue is an acoustic rock band made up of three brothers from Florida. They established themselves with the release of a debut album, "All You Were Meant To Be," featuring all original works. The sound on that album is rather generic; standard rock rhythms back up great lyrics in a final result that's pleasing but not particularly novel. Luckily, Boyce Avenue then proceeded to create a succession of four albums made up entirely of acoustic covers. While this concept is nothing new, the song selections, vocals, and subtle additions introduced by the band are brilliant. Looking through the track lists it appears that the brothers tuned into a few popular radio stations, wrote down the names of the first 40 songs they heard, and decided to play everything on an acoustic guitar. The resulting albums included hits like Umbrella (Rihanna), Bleeding Love (Leona Lewis), Viva La Vida (Coldplay), and No Air (Jordin Sparks). Some songs lend themselves immediately to acoustic variations. But stripping down chart topping hip-hop songs to a single set of vocals and strings leaves a very bare product. Most tracks work--a few such as Usher's, Love In This Club, simply sound ridiculous when you have no background beats to distract from the actual words. With four albums you're bound to find somethings you like, somethings you don't, and somethings you never imagined you'd hear on acoustic guitar.

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