HEAVY MUSIC HISTORY: Cavalier Youth – You Me At Six
British pop-punk legends YOU ME AT SIX have had countless successful albums, and many songs that will easily go down in the history of alternative music. While they are better known for albums such as Sinners Never Sleep, or their more recent Suckapunch or last year’s Truth Decay, 2014’s Cavalier Youth is arguably their strongest album, and possibly the one their fans hold the most dear. With extreme nostalgia, anthem-like sound and a perfect fusion of pop and rock, it’s easy to understand why it is still so loved, even ten years on. With the band choosing to celebrate the anniversary with a tour, and selling it out months before, it’s clear that Cavalier Youth hasn’t lost its impact over time.
While the band were steadily building in success and fame since their formation in 2005, it was Sinners Never Sleep six years later that catapulted their career, and collaborations with Oli Sykes from BRING ME THE HORIZON and Winston McCall from PARKWAY DRIVE solidified their place in the alternative rock scene of the time. With three studio albums, the beginning of commercial success, and having just sold out Wembley Arena to commemorate the end of an era, the band were clearly riding a high.
It wasn’t until three years after their last release that the band felt ready to put out another album, and it was supposedly pretty difficult to figure out what to do next. At this point, the band had just left Virgin Records, and signed to BMG, creating the feeling that change was definitely on the way. While they had definitely coined a distinctive sound, they were consistently growing and changing with each album, and at this point, there was significantly more attention on them, presumably putting the pressure on. Although this means that it is almost impossible to please everyone, the release of Cavalier Youth was an almost immediate success in their fanbase. Despite its release in January, the album’s upbeat and carefree sound made it a summer classic in the scene. Additionally, this made it more appealing to a wider audience, gaining them new, and different, fans.
In their previous albums, YOU ME AT SIX were known for the tongue-in-cheek attitude, and with the release of Cavalier Youth, it’s clear they were trying to move away from that. In both sound and lyrics, the consensus is maturity and seriousness, while maintaining a mostly positive and outgoing attitude. The songs are impactful, with countless meaningful messages to be taken from them. This was clear from the first single Lived A Lie, which is nothing less than inspiring, with the strapline “we are believers” becoming a mantra for their fans.
This energy was maintained with Fresh Start Fever and Room To Breathe, which are both rousing and insightful, and are clearly fan favourites even now. Six months after its release, the band played the mainstage at Reading Festival, carrying the setlist with Cavalier Youth, and that performance is clear visual proof of the sheer impact that the album had on the general public. In a year when pop-punk was dominating the UK alternative scene, YOU ME AT SIX were very obviously leading the charge once again.
Opening with Too Young to Feel This Old, the tone was set from the beginning: Cavalier Youth would be a reflective, intense, and slightly angsty album. While not entirely depressing, it asks important questions, and disregards the existential attitude towards the end, with a reminder to just live. Fresh Start Fever is a track in a whole league of its own, with moody piano, driving drum beats and an explosive chorus. Cold Night is very reminiscent of their previous album, a sad, but romantic ballad in typical YOU ME AT SIX fashion.
Love Me Like You Used To is an interesting one when listening in hindsight, as many of their newer tracks are extremely reflective of it, and the confrontational lyrics and heavy metaphors come completely naturally for the band. Carpe Diem is arguably criminally underrated, creating the perfect nostalgic summer energy, with an irresistibly cheesy chorus guaranteed to make any mood better. Wild Ones ends the album, and encapsulates everything it was trying to say, acknowledging the hurt and difficult times, but pushing forward an infectious optimism and ‘it is what it is’ kind of realisation.
Commercially, Cavalier Youth was YOU ME AT SIX’S most successful at that point, and the first to hit number one in the UK album chart, and reaching top 40 in many other countries. It went down very well in UK magazines, making top 20 in both Kerrang! and Rock Sound’s album of the year lists, and winning best single in the 2014 Kerrang! awards. While some of their later albums would do even better, this was ground breaking for the band at the time, and definitely paved the way for their future success. Critically, opinions were extremely mixed, and while Alternative Press stating, “Cavalier Youth is brimming with the kind of rafter-reaching rock that’s tailor made for filling Wembley Arena”, other publications didn’t rate it so highly. The Guardian specifically gave it a harsh one out of five stars, stating, “their fourth album, all formulaic riffs, festival-friendly choruses and timeworn sentiments, is corporate alt-rock at its most pedestrian”.
For the fans though, the lasting impact of Cavalier Youth cannot be understated, and the hordes of people coming to see YOU ME AT SIX play a decade-old album on this current tour is the proof.
Cavalier Youth was originally released on January 27th via BMG.
Like YOU ME AT SIX on Facebook.