Destroy All Music: Stuff That May Or May Not Be Worth Listening To
Destroy All Music
March 25, 2005
The HellacoptersBy The Grace of God2004 Liquor And Poker Music (www.liquorandpokermusic.com)
This is the perfect album for the rock music fan that hates rock music. If you’re too cold, callous, and jaded to listen to the radio, and the last album you actually enjoyed buying to was by Thin Lizzy, then let Swedish imports, The Hellacopters, give you a little hope that the kids actually are all right after all. Sonic guitars and razor sharp melodies melt together in a fist-pumping solid rock wall of sound that’s so tight that mom and dad may have some trouble listening to their old Led Zeppelin LPs over it. The lyrics cover the usual range of rock and roll subjects: love, losing love, getting wasted and losing everything else, getting wasted and finding love again, finding wasted love and losing it to your love of everything else. They’re big in Europe, if that means anything to you, and if they manage to catch on here the Hellacopters are so hot they might just ignite The Darkness’ trousers on fire.
The ExiesHead For The Door2004 Virgin Records (www.virginrecords.com)
It seems like the re-animated corpse of Scott Weiland is back at it again. No, not THE re-animated corps of Scott Weiland, the one who is currently fronting an entire group of re-animated corpses with Velvet Revolver, but instead just one of the many bands who seem to not have the ambition to progress very far beyond the alternative rock crunch-via-stadium-rock production sound of bands like Nickleback or whatever else is on WBCN. If you’re one of those dudes who traded in your flannel tee-shirts for a Von Dutch beanie and a tribal tattoo circa 1998, then The Exies latest album might be right up your alley, because honestly they are very good at what they do. Thick groves and jagged feedback-laden riffing ensure that these 12 tracks of solid hooks don’t sound too prefabricated. If the formation of Audioslave had you happily proclaiming that rock radio was finely returning to its roots, then check out The Exies. If you made a similar roots of rock proclamation to Franz Ferdinand, then just wait two more years for the retro-grunge revival and see how ahead of their time The Exies were: by being so 10 years ago.
Titan Go King’s Sound Sampler 012004 Benten Label (www.Sister.co.jp)
Are we supposed to be laughing with or at this band? Wait a second, were they just laughing at us? The Titan Go King’s only aim is to please as these three Mountain Dew-fueled teenage girls from Kyoto, Japan kick and scream their way as fast as they can through the proverbially pop-punk playground. You might get the sense they’re trying to finish the songs in time to get back home and catch the latest episode of Sailor Moon. They bounce, yelp, and butcher the English language to the tune of danceable happy-thrash. Sort of like if the X-Ray Spex and The Ramones had a glue sniffing party together and then decided to eat a big chocolate cake with their hands. De-licious!
