"Life, Love & Hope", an album 10 years in the making (2003-2013), sounds like it was recorded in a month on GarageBand. I am a HUGE Boston fan and loved the crisp clean sound on "Boston", "Don't Look Back", "Third Stage", and hell even the production on "Walk On" and "Corporate America" was pretty damn good although they failed to match the caliber of the original 3 albums. But LL&H,"Life, Love & Hope", an album 10 years in the making (2003-2013), sounds like it was recorded in a month on GarageBand. I am a HUGE Boston fan and loved the crisp clean sound on "Boston", "Don't Look Back", "Third Stage", and hell even the production on "Walk On" and "Corporate America" was pretty damn good although they failed to match the caliber of the original 3 albums. But LL&H, although maintaining the classic Tom Scholz harmony, sounds too processed and lazy with a drum sound that sounds like it could have been pulled of an 80s Yahama drum machine (oh wait it was). This is NOT the sound I expected from an audiophile. However some songs on this album are pretty damn good. "Heaven On Earth" opens with a beautiful harmonizing riff from Scholz and it reminds you that with all the crappy music that appears on the radio today, the classic rock sound still is present. David Victor and Louis St. August perform excellently on this track with vocals mirroring the late great Brad Delp and Scholz does an excellent job with his solo. Skipping over the remastered "Didn't Mean To Fall In Love" (lazy on Scholz's part) is the instrumental "Last Day Of School" which is very vibrant with piano reminiscent of a Jim Steinman tune and a guitar sound channeling Brian May. However, this track highlights the tin sounding digital drums. Track 4, "Sail Away" features Scholz expanding his musical creativity with the use of synths and a spoken word part from Kimberley Dahme in the intro. When the piano kicks in, Brad Delp takes lead vocals and delivers a beautiful performance that puts all the other vocalists on this album to shame. The song is a beautiful track that serves as a criticism to the botched Hurricane Katrina efforts. Track 5, "Life, Love, and Hope" features Tommy DeCarlo on vocals and again has that classic Boston sound with a guitar performance from Gary Phil. It is a good song but there is not much to say about it. Track 6, "If You Were In Love", is sung by Dahme, who does a good job but the song is very generic and sounds like a Celine Dion B-side. Track 7, "Someday" is the worst track on the album. It sounds like a bad 80s parody and is messy and all over the place (with a freggin harmonica solo WTF). The only thing good about it is the anti-bullying message it promotes. Track 8, "Love Got Away" is Tom Scholz lead vocal debut and although he is not the best singer he does have that Bob Dylan esque rasp to his voice accompanied by an acoustic guitar. The vocal harmony on this song is reminiscent of "The Byrds" and to me is one of the better songs on the album. Tracks 9 & 10 are recycled versions of "Someone" and "You Gave Up On Love" from Corporate America which again I think is lazy and unnecessary. Track 11 is "The Way You Look Tonight" with DeCarlo again on vocals. It is a good song that sounds like it came straight out of the 80s. This also is another great song that saves this album. The album would have ranked 8/10 for me but the bad production quality, bad drum sound, and recycled songs brought it down to a 6/10.… Expand