"What You Don't See" Revisited: 5 Years Later

The following is an album review I wrote in honor of the 5 year anniversary of one of my favorite discs. Enjoy. 

I’ll never forget my first exposure to The Story So Far. A friend was visiting town, one of those friends who will grab the nearest guitar and just go at it with no regard for what else is going on in a room. True to his character, he used his sixth sense to sniff out my acoustic Alvarez, and he dove straight in to “Clairvoyant”. Always down to listen to something new, I asked him what that song was and he responded with simply “The Story So Far, you should check them out”. That night I blindly downloaded What You Don’t See and waited for my next car ride to fire it up, having no idea what was in store for me. 

One of TSSF’s greatest strengths is opening a disc. They are absolute masters of convincing listeners that the entire album is worth their time in the span of just one song. While “States and Minds/Roam” and “Smile” are both phenomenal intros to their respective albums, there are few opening tracks that do their job quite like “Things I Can’t Change”. Not only is it an explosive opening that sucks you right in, it does an incredible job of setting the frustrated, helpless tone that permeates through the album as a whole. In title and lyrics, “Things I Can’t Change” functions as a deeper thesis for the disc than even its title. This song blew me away on the first listen, and from then on I was full-on addicted. 

In July 2016, I dragged an ex-girlfriend to Warped in Orlando. This was my second time seeing TSSF, and it did not disappoint. Before closing the set with “Roam”, Parker Cannon took a second to thank the audience, but not in a way I’d ever heard before. “We’re The Story So Far, thank you all for listening. There’s not much to us.” That sentence completely reframed the way I saw the band, particularly What You Don’t See. 

The beauty of this disc isn’t that it makes you think your way through complex emotional metaphors or paints a detailed picture. What You Don’t See (and TSSF as a whole) derives lyrical value from Cannon’s ability to articulate things that everyone can relate to, but can’t necessarily find the words for themselves. Take “Face Value”, one of my personal favorite tracks, as an example. The hook closes with an outwardly simple exclamation: “All of the plans that you made never included me.” That sentence on its own is something that everyone who has had a relationship unexpectedly fall apart can relate to, but it is one hell of a feeling to try and put into words. That is what The Story So Far so adeptly offers on What You Don’t See. They hand you the words for exactly what you’re feeling over and over in a brilliantly uncomplicated way.

Five years later and I still fire this disc up several times a month. Whether I need to revisit the furnace of my anger on “Face Value”, lament my way through “All Wrong” and “Bad Luck”, or just remember what it feels like to have an empty space, this disc is where I turn. There aren’t many pop-punk outfits that are comparable to The Story So Far as a whole, but when it comes down to venting pure frustration, What You Don’t See is the golden standard.