journals vs everything after

Listening to “All That Matters” and the Journals album in general and I have to ask if you guys hear what I’m hearing. His voice is still fantastic today but in journals and believe he has this quality to his voice that I don’t hear today. I mean this in the best way possible, but it sounds like he was in that studio thinking he was the shit and it comes through in the recording. He really leans into this sort of whining quality when he goes up in his register and makes a lot of cool choices with his runs and riffs. There’s this confidence you can hear throughout the whole album that just hasn’t been there in this last three projects