Tales Don't Tell Themselves

Tales Don't Tell Themselves is the third album by Welsh post-hardcore band Funeral for a Friend. It charted at #3 in the UK selling 25,000 copies in its first week and later went silver.

Tales Don't Tell Themselves
Studio album by
Funeral for a Friend
Released14 May 2007
GenreAlternative rock, post-hardcore
Length40:50
LabelAtlantic
ProducerGil Norton
Funeral for a Friend chronology
Hours
(2005)		 Tales Don't Tell Themselves
(2007)		 Memory and Humanity
(2008)
Singles from Tales Don't Tell Themselves
  1. "Into Oblivion (Reunion)"
    Released: 7 May 2007
  2. "Walk Away"
    Released: 23 July 2007

It was released on 14 May 2007. Before the release of the album, the band released several short studio update videos informing fans of their progress. During the recording of the album, Matt Davies used the same microphone he used to record the group's first album Casually Dressed and Deep in Conversation and Ryan Richards recorded his drum parts by recording cymbals separately from the rest of his drum parts and replacing the normal cymbals with electric ones whilst recording basic drums. Davies plays guitar on several of the songs; this is the first album in which he has done so.

On 13 February 2007, the band released the track "Out of Reach" as a taster for fans.[1] The lead single from the album, "Into Oblivion (Reunion)", was released on 7 May 2007. The song was first played on The Zane Lowe rock show on 19 March and the official music video was uploaded to the band's MySpace page shortly after. According to Davies, speaking at a performance at Manchester's Apollo Theatre, the second single from the album is to be "Walk Away".

The album was released in Japan with two bonus tracks: "Rise and Fall" and "Crash and Burn (Home Demo)"; which were also sold as bonus tracks on iTunes.

Concept and themes

Davies has mentioned that it is a concept album:

David is a Fisherman who is captain of a boat that regularly trawls the deep waters, he comes from a small fishing town on the coast where his wife Eleanor and daughter Isabelle await his return, but a huge storm is quickly approaching it hits the town and then batters David's boat and leaves him shipwrecked in the middle of the ocean as the only survivor. He spends days adrift going crazy and delirious wondering if he will ever see his family again, meanwhile the towns people fear that the fishermen are all dead, the coast guards rescue attempts have failed to recover any survivors. David becomes so delirious his life flashes before his eyes (he guides his younger self through his life as a blackbird) he eventually hits land and snaps out of his delusion. He is scared of the waters and the colossal waves and power that killed his crew but he decides that doing nothing to get back to Eleanor and Isabelle is a cowardly way out so he decides to build a small raft and brave the elements once again, this time he is found by a lifeboat and reunited with his family. The End. Basically, Cast Away meets The Perfect Storm, it has a lot to do with my own personal fears of the ocean and coming to terms with that through the story.[2]

The video for Walk Away was played on 8 June 2007 on Kerrang! TV. The video concerns the missing fisherman around whom the album is based. It follows his wife and daughter both breaking down. The video ends with the mother realising she cannot go on like this and trying to continue with her life. There are also scenes of Davies singing on a couch. The video was added to the Kerrang! playlist.

Reception
Professional ratings
Aggregate scores
SourceRating
Metacritic(52/100)[3]
Review scores
SourceRating
AbsolutePunk(80%)[4]
Allmusic[5]
NME[6]
Spin[7]
Exclaim.ca(Mixed)[8]

Tales Don't Tell Themselves received mixed reception from music critics. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, the album received an average score of 52, based on 6 reviews, which indicates "Mixed or average reviews".[3]

Track listing
No.TitleLength
1."Into Oblivion (Reunion)"4:25
2."The Great Wide Open"3:32
3."The Diary"3:40
4."On a Wire"3:59
5."All Hands on Deck: Part 1: Raise the Sail"3:26
6."All Hands on Deck: Part 2: Open Water"3:48
7."Out of Reach"3:34
8."One for the Road"4:10
9."Walk Away"3:48
10."The Sweetest Wave"6:25
Total length:40:50
iTunes and Japanese bonus tracks
No.TitleLength
11."Rise and Fall"3:27
12."Crash and Burn" (Home Demo)4:21

Charts
Chart performance for Tales Don't Tell Themselves
Chart (2007) Peak
position
Australian Albums (ARIA)[9] 43
German Albums (Offizielle Top 100)[10] 96
Irish Albums (IRMA)[11] 27
Scottish Albums (OCC)[12] 4
UK Albums (OCC)[13] 3
UK Rock & Metal Albums (OCC)[14] 2
US Billboard 200[15] 135

References
  1. "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 16 February 2007. Retrieved 13 February 2007.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  2. "// Alternative Press Magazine \\". Alternative Press. Archived from the original on 26 September 2007. Retrieved 21 June 2007.
  3. "Tales Don't Tell Themselves by Funeral For A Friend Reviews and Tracks". Metacritic. CBS Interactive. Retrieved 22 April 2012.
  4. "Funeral for a Friend - Tales Don't Tell Themselves - Album Review". AbsolutePunk. 16 August 2023.
  5. "Tales Don't Tell Themselves - Funeral for a Friend". Allmusic.
  6. "Funeral For A Friend". NME. 16 May 2007.
  7. "Funeral for a Friend, 'Tales Don't Tell Themselves' (Atlantic)". Spin. 25 June 2007.
  8. Dave Synyard (May 2004). "Funeral for a Friend - Tales Don't Tell Themselves • Pop & Rock Reviews • exclaim.ca". Exclaim.ca. Retrieved 2 August 2012.
  9. "Australiancharts.com – Funeral for a Friend – Tales Don't Tell Themselves". Hung Medien. Retrieved 24 August 2022.
  10. "Offiziellecharts.de – Funeral for a Friend – Tales Don't Tell Themselves" (in German). GfK Entertainment Charts. Retrieved 24 August 2022.
  11. "Irish-charts.com – Discography Funeral for a Friend". Hung Medien. Retrieved 24 August 2022.
  12. "Official Scottish Albums Chart Top 100". Official Charts Company. Retrieved 24 August 2022.
  13. "Official Albums Chart Top 100". Official Charts Company. Retrieved 24 August 2022.
  14. "Official Rock & Metal Albums Chart Top 40". Official Charts Company. Retrieved 24 August 2022.
  15. "Funeral for a Friend Chart History (Billboard 200)". Billboard. Retrieved 24 August 2022.
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