Lost in the Sound of Separation

Lost in the Sound of Separation is the sixth album by American metalcore band Underoath. The album was released on September 2, 2008.^[2][3] The album title is taken from a line of the lyrics of "We Are the Involuntary". In an interview with MTV News about the effort, the band stated it featured 11 songs that total around 42 minutes.^[4] It is the band's last release with founding member and drummer, Aaron Gillespie.

The album was nominated for a Grammy Award at the 52nd Grammy Awards for "Best Boxed or Special Limited Edition Package".^[5] Prior to the album's release it was said to be a lot "heavier" and "darker" than Underoath's previous album Define the Great Line. A handful of people from MTV were the first to listen to several of the songs off the album, saying afterward that "The songs were anthemic, feedback-filled numbers that build slowly to their thunderous, ear-splitting crescendos."

Promotion

Beginning on August 1, 2008 Underoath encouraged their male fans to grow a beard for one month until the US release date of the album, September 2, 2008.^[6][7] The rules were that participants were to upload a picture of their beard to the website daily to show the progress of their beard growth. For the duration of the growth, a widget could be placed on a participant's social networking website to display pictures of his progress. On the release date of the album, Underoath asked for fans to take pictures of both their beard and a copy of Lost in the Sound of Separation. All members of the band also participated in the event.^[8] Popular music review and information site AbsolutePunk were also running a contest in conjunction with Tooth & Nail, giving members of AbsolutePunk the opportunity to win an Underoath prize pack.^[9]

Two weeks before the release of the album, Underoath announced that a very limited quantity of "golden passes" were packaged with select copies of Lost in the Sound of Separation. The winner of a golden pass is allowed into any Underoath concert for the rest of their formation.^[10] Any edition of the album may contain a golden pass.

Reception

Even before its release, the album had been welcomed with critical acclaim with reviewers from Alternative Press, and on Soul-Audio.com, a music review site, staff critic John Wofford declared the album "a masterpiece," calling it both "frightening" and "rewarding" and giving it a rating of 9.5 out of a possible 10.^[11] This marks only the second time a score so high has been awarded in the site's history. During Soul-Audio's End of the Year features, Wofford deemed Lost in the Sound of Separation the best album of 2008.^[11] In its first week, Lost in the Sound of Separation debuted at #8 on the Billboard 200 charts, selling around 56,000 copies in the US alone.

Different editions

Four different versions of Lost in the Sound of Separation were made available, each with its own cover art. A standard edition, a special edition, a deluxe edition, and a vinyl edition. The standard edition comes with the CD and a 20 page booklet. The special edition comes with a bonus DVD containing a 40 minute making of the album documentary in addition to the CD and booklet. The documentary found on the bonus DVD was produced by The Audible Diversion Group and was filmed and edited by Tim McTague and filmmaker Ryan E. Gardner. The deluxe edition is a five-panel digipak containing two 10" colored "saw-blade" die cut heavy gram vinyl and a 56 page book in addition to the CD and DVD. The deluxe edition is also limited to 5,000 copies, which are hand numbered and signed by the band.^[12] A fourth version of the album, a standard 12" vinyl record, was later released.

Additionally, on July 30, 2008 the band released 10 limited edition "suitcase" packs hand painted by Justin Nelson of Verdure Studio and released through Underoath's webstore in conjunction with The Audible Diversion Group. Nine of the suitcases were put for sale and the tenth retained to be given away in a sweepstakes through the webstore. All nine suitcase packages sold out in approximately 11 minutes.

Due to a manufacturing issue with the deluxe edition vinyl set, the release date was pushed back several weeks. To make sure that everyone who pre-ordered the deluxe edition would get to hear the new album by the official release date, Underoath worked with Tooth & Nail Records to send out digital copies of the album. An email was sent out to those who pre-ordered the record with a link to download the album.^[13]

Awards

In 2010, the deluxe edition was nominated for a Dove Award for Recorded Music Packaging of the Year at the 41st GMA Dove Awards. The song "Too Bright to See" was also nominated for Short Form Music Video of the Year.^[14]

Singles

Underoath shot the video for the first single from Lost in the Sound of Separation titled "Desperate Times, Desperate Measures" in Los Angeles, California on July 14, 2008.^[15] The song was released on the band's MySpace on July 22 at Midnight EST / 9 PM PST. It has also been announced that this single will be featured on the soundtrack of the upcoming release of Madden NFL 09.^[16] As a result of the new song being on the Madden 2009 soundtrack, it will be downloadable on iTunes in coming weeks as part of a special "Madden" playlist.^[17] The single is also featured in the game Rock Band 2 along with 19 other songs on a free track pack.^[18]

The second single from the album, "Too Bright to See, Too Loud to Hear" was released April 20, 2009, and the music video for the song was the winning video created by a contestant in a contest exclusive to the United Kingdom.^[19][20]

Track listing

Release history

Personnel

References

External links

• Lost in the Sound of Separation at Metacritic
• Septembeard