Jack's Mannequin -Everything In Transit

Sat 7th Oct, 2006 in Music Reviews

Everything in Transit by the pop-alternative group known as Jack’s Mannequin is an allegorical and surreal journey through all of life’s highs and lows. The album has been shaped into a story which is divided into chapters rather than songs. This record is a requisite for every person’s album collection as it is emotionally uplifting and quite often enables you to identify with the deep, poetic lyrics. Everything in Transit consists of a song for every moment, every mood and every occasion. The album is probably more relevant and better suited to an adult audience which is ironic in itself as most pop rock type music is usually made to be relevant to your atypical emotionally charged teenager.

Everything in Transit is a beautifully crafted album; instrumentally, lyrically and structurally. The songs are so pure and organic that the listening process has a cleansing effect on the listener and quite often encourages escapism. The passion and sincerity with which vocalist/pianist Andrew McMahon expresses his lyrics has the listener hanging on to every word and understanding every feeling and thought process which he experiences.

It is music such as this which the modern music scene is lacking. Very rarely do you find bands that feel so passionately and sincerely about what they are expressing that their music has a cathartic effect on both the band and the listener. Too often bands are writing lyrics just to fill space rather than really getting in touch with what they are really feeling or thinking. It is such a pleasant change to find a band such as Jack’s Mannequin who disregard this sort of artificiality and dive back into the roots of our human nature.

One thing which I have always enjoyed is when calm, laid-back bands that make soft pop music produce little bursts of angst within their songs. In the song I’m Ready Andrew McMahon tries his hardest to express some sort of rebellion with the line “I put on the same clothes I wore yesterday. When did society decide that we have to change and wash a t-shirt after every individual use? If it’s not dirty I’m going to wear it.” Look at little Andrew trying to go punk rock on society with his angry words, he’s so cute.

Throughout the album it becomes apparent that Andrew is better suited to his nostalgic lyrics made up of poetic surrealism. For example, the album opener Holiday From Real causes the listener to trace back to their favourite summer memories when he hits them with “Oh California in the summer. Ah and my hair is growing long. Fuck yeah, we can live like this.” Such warm and positive thoughts cause the listener to highly anticipate the upcoming summer months and reminisce about their past holidays.

Andrew McMahon proves himself to be a Jack’s Mannequin of all trades with each song throughout Everything In Transit by constructing lyrics for every mood. The following is a short list of my personal favourites:

Whether you like the sound of Jack’s Mannequin or not, you can’t deny the talent and imagination required to produce lyrics of that calibre. Although Everything in Transit may be easily confused with the soundtrack to the O.C., it is light-hearted and upbeat music such as this which has a place in everybody’s music collection. In a hectic and stress-ridden society such as ours, I think everybody could do with a dose of beautifully pure and sincere music to take you away from here. McMahon’s lyrics are an exceptional example of beautiful imagery and touching poetry, something which is hard to come by in this day in age. Right up there with Augie March, Jack’s Mannequin effectively present listening bliss to the audience through both music and poetry resulting in a beautiful fusion of deep thinking and organic sounds which delve deeply into human subconsciousness to create an image worthy of being placed in the Louvre.