If Not For Me Share Highly-Anticipated New Album, 'Everything You Wanted' and Unveil Single "Tragedy"

If Not For Me Share Highly-Anticipated New Album, 'Everything You Wanted' and Unveil Single "Tragedy"

If Not For Me released their new album Everything You Wanted on March 29th, just about 2 weeks ago. I immediately jumped at reviewing this as I had already had one of the singles, “Blameless” on repeat. However, after a listen through of the album, I knew that I needed to marinate in this. I wanted to listen to this album with the windows down, windows up, at noon, at 5pm, after a bad day at work, after a relaxing Saturday… I wanted to know how this album stayed with me. I cannot tell you how happy I am I did so. 

Providing a quintessential metal core album, this is a ‘hard to go wrong by’ album. With songs ranging from in your feels to rage against your feels, they really covered their bases here. But what stood out to me from the first listen through was just the pure sincerity and emotion presented in the album. Patty Glover, If Not For Me’s Vocalist, speaks of his inspiration for the album being the hardships he’s gone through in the last 5 years. From romantically stable, to experiencing the absolute drudgery of the current dating scene, the emotions we’re all dealing with are perfectly portrayed through this album. 

The album starts out with “Feel Me Now,” a song that gives the same vibe as The Word Alive’s & Bad Omen’s "One of Us." This is one of those songs it’s just hard not to vibe to with the windows down while you’re singing along with. While I enjoy it, I’m always eager to get to the next song, “Blameless.” This song has a little bit of everything to keep everyone happy, but the mixture of unclean vocals and catchy lyrics has me head banging like I’ve been personally victimized by whoever this song is about and keeps the energy high just 2 songs into the album. 

One of the songs I was taken back by was “I Don’t Wanna Be Here.” At first it was just a quiet chuckle and a “same” regarding the name but after a listen to, it became just a deep felt “same” regarding the whole song. With unclean vocals for cathartic emphasis, this song resonates a lot with me personally regarding a place or space in life that you’re a bit stuck in and are trying to get out of. When I said this album had ‘in your feels songs,’ this is definitely one of them.

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The albums name sake, “Everything You Wanted,” absolutely lives rent free in my head. Glover speaks on the name being twofold- sincere in realizing what you actually do want in and from life to sarcastic in a “I hope it was everything you wanted” type of way. I would be lying through my teeth if I didn’t get some deep seated joy from listening to this song. I have such a long personal story where this song could essentially be the soundtrack and man oh man did it feel good listening to this song. After the last 5 years we’ve all had, I guarantee you that you’re going to feel better after listening to this song. 

Along with the release of this album, If Not For Me also released a music video for their final song for this album, “Tragedy.” With Glover stating this song was how he felt about the current world we’re living in, this song hits hard on several different fronts. With lyrics like “We’re all martyrs of misery we didn’t ask to be living proof of a dying dream wave goodbye to your empathy,” there’s just scientifically and mathematically no way this song doesn’t go hard, get stuck in your head, and become a new repeat favorite of yours. Combined that with the unclean vocals, this song is sweet sweet validation that it’s not just your world burning, it’s everyone’s world burning. At this point, let’s grab some marshmallows and toast them together. 

This whole album is such a great place for If Not For Me to be. It could just be my own personal parallels to a lot of the songs, but this seems like a closing of a strife filled chapter for them. With what If Not For Me has done in the past, and what this album brings to the table, I am genuinely excited for what they’re going to be doing in the future and what they’re going to be bringing to the metal genre. Cheers guys- may your marshmallows never burn.