The Touchtones set the table for Finishing Touches with an interesting backstory: the title "stemmed from the fact that this album was being crafted for a couple of years. The original recordings were done in an attic in Covid [sic] and disappeared for a little bit but after recovering these recordings we were able to craft together this album." Loud cheers for salvaging something positive from a pandemic that took so much from everyone, but "craft" in this case sounds more like a rough-cut scissors-and-glue affair on the production end of the release.

No credits were provided to RARB except the original performing artists, so I can only take a guess at what happened in the attic and the years since on the production front, and I can't talk about arrangers by name without credits, but this is where the biggest frustrations bubble up as a listener. There was some novel thought given to the standard Killing Me Softly; there are new chords here, there are new approaches here in the vocals and voice leading, though some of it comes with a concerning head tip. All the same, no one needs a literal transcription of Killing Me Softly, so I'll take it. But we also get our first listen at the audio work on this release, and it's not up to 2025 standards by a long mark. It's giving "live recording with a bunch of reverb", though there's some mixing involved which you can particularly hear in the bass; but overall, not what you'd expect to hear in terms of polish and enhancements.

Ghost is far more successful, with a chorus that sounds jubilant and more fresh elements in the arrangement to distinguish The Touchtones' arrangement from the original and other a cappella renditions. But, the mix is still a little muddy. Movement gets more polarizing; the strong lead has what could be an award-winning voice, but we don't get crisp enough clarity to really hear her nuances and full coloring. The chords sound rich — and again, novel — but it's just not mixed well enough to separate the vocal lines and really relish the experience. I find the opening measures of All For Us nearly unlistenable on the production front, but then it blossoms into another strong soloist, though still stuck behind mixing that's still just a bit off. Why Her Not Me has a few notes out of the lead's lower range that disrupt the flow, something else that could have been adjusted in the arrangement or mixing. The release begins to wrap with Does She Know, where we get yet another strong and flashy lead, but this time, enthusiastic backs are too far into the lead's space, making dynamics and volume sound more mono-level. If I Go gets a lot closer to a balanced track, showcasing yet another great lead, but this time, more keen attention to the mix and levels, too.

I'll tell you this: there are some wildly talented voices dancing on the lead lines of Finishing Touches. Unfortunately, we don't get to hear the storytelling in a way that fosters a lasting connection for the listener.

The last time I reviewed The Touchtones, it was a short album that lacked focus. Now, fourteen years and several releases later, it seems we have come full circle.

To be fair, Finishing Touches isn't trying to be an album in the traditional sense. It has a good excuse for sounding disjointed. The unusually long recording span (five years!) reflects the fact that recordings done during the COVID-19 pandemic were lost for several years before being recovered — at which point the group was, in their words, "able to craft together this album".

Despite what must have been a good deal of excitement at finding these long-lost recordings, they are not all gems. Killing Me Softly — already a chestnut in 2020, much less 2025 — is a mess of wrong chords, or missing voice lines, or possibly both. It completely loses the melody in the second chorus, and there is absolutely no passion in the "whoa"s of the final chorus. The closing chord comes completely out of left field, and it's a choice that's more puzzling than interesting. I doubt I'd be picking on this song quite so much if it weren't the opener.

Nearly all the songs on this album seem to have a mixing problem, or maybe it's an arranging problem: the leads tend to get overpowered by the backs. This is a particular issue with the lower-voiced leads on Movement and Why Her Not Me. On Movement, the verses are almost completely lost — which is a shame, since the lead here sings with a pathos that indicates she understood the assignment. The lead on Why Her Not Me has a great mezzo belt but seems to be reaching for the lowest notes; a sparser and more top-heavy arrangement would have highlighted her better. Even the impressive lead on If I Go, who sounds like she's firmly in her tessitura throughout, gets subsumed by the backs too often for my taste.

Fortunately, it's not all bad news. Ghost (Ella Henderson, not Indigo Girls) would have made a much better opener than Killing Me Softly, though its inclusion feels a little behind the times in 2025. There are several nice arranging moments here. Going into the bridge, the whole group comes in on an ascending "mm", a motif that's repeated throughout the remainder of the track. The lead has plenty of spunky energy and range to spare; her high end is particularly impressive. Movement also has a lovely coda and a surprising high note at the end — a nice texture that appears in several other tracks as well. (Unfortunately, I can't credit the leads or arrangers by name, since the group did not provide any track credits.)

And of course there's All For Us, to which the majority of the production budget was clearly allocated. The mix is much better here, although it helps that there isn't as much going on in the backs during the verses. It's a fantastic studio arrangement that wisely doesn't try to imitate the Labrinth original note for note. Instead, it captures the electronica spirit of the original and combines it with a snarky attitude from the backs that is pure Touchtones. It's not as slick or interesting as the Harvard Opportunes' 2022 version, but it is distinct, and that alone is worth praising. Coming in at a slim 2:52, it does what it needs to do and doesn't mess around, and I want more.

Even in this modern era of on-demand streaming, I believe there is still a place for albums that are deliberately programmed by their artists. Finishing Touches is not one of those albums, but we can at least be glad that these tracks finally got the audience they deserve.

We've all had that moment before. We start working on that big term paper in college, or that important work memo for our boss before the big presentation — and right in the middle of it all, your computer just decides it's had enough, and all your hard work is just gone. I can already feel your panic as you read this. Fear not, however, because after some miraculous work by the unsung hero in the IT department, you manage to get the document back and finish it, even if it's a little past deadline. Well, the Touchtones faced the music version of that exact scenario with this album; the recording process started back in 2020 "in an attic during Covid [sic]", only for the recordings to "disappear for a bit". Upon finally getting them back years later, the group was ready to put on the "finishing touches" to give us their second release this year. Another example of persistence paying off!

So, what do we as listeners get from a five-year recording process? With a track list that spans the gamut from The Fugees to Hozier, there's certainly a lot of potential here. That said, there are a lot of opportunities that simply weren't taken advantage of. One of the best tracks on the album is Ella Henderson's Ghost, which has both a beautiful and gritty solo and a good balance from the background vocals that offers great dynamic contrast throughout the track. But that example of dynamic contrast isn't carried throughout the entire album as I feel like it could have been. This was noticeable on the opening track, Killing Me Softly, in a number of instances where I think it would have served the group well to decrescendo in the verses before coming back with a bit more volume in the chorus. Instead, we just get a steady mezzo forte or forte throughout the entire track that doesn't really allow the group anywhere to grow.

The opposite is the case in Why Her Not Me, where I sometimes have difficultly hearing the backing vocals over the solo because the backing vocals are consistently at a mezzo piano. Now, part of this could be the mix of the tracks, but I think the bigger issue is that the Touchtones need to spend a bit more time thinking about the overall dynamics and phrasing of the tracks in the backing vocals. I noted this in my recent album review of Girl Crush as well; whether it's in the arranging of the pieces (where I think it should happen to start), or just in the natural rehearsal process of the tracks, more attention needs to be brought to these elements by the music directors of the group. Remember: just because the backing vocals may not be on words and simply on "dum dum"s, they have just as important of a role as the soloist in telling the story of the track.

Despite the lack of dynamic differences in the backing of If I Go, I do really like this track to close out the album. The lead is strong and passionate, and she demonstrates great range and agility through the bridge. I would highlight the name of the soloist, but we weren't provided with that information for this review by the group. The backing vocals were also mixed well and were balanced well with the soloist, but there were some opportunities in the bridge and even in the verses where I would have liked to see more growth musically.

The one overarching message that I hope the Touchtones take into their next record is to spend more time focusing on overall musicality. Oh, also be sure to back up all recordings into the cloud, just in case.