OK, so I just bought this on vinyl yesterday. It's really pretty, too. Super shiny cover (watch out on the dance floor at a Bloody Hollies show - if you fall they'll pummel you!), and a super flat red record with custom labels. Now you may ask, "I thought he didn't want to talk new stuff?" and you'd be right. But I had an old blog and I've had this on CD since 2005 and it was my album of the year when I did that sort of thing. I found it at a place in Cleveland called The Loop. The Loop is a coffee shop that sells records and CD's. I'm guessing they do most of their business in coffee, but I found a few things I wanted. I've been meaning to go there for ages and I finally did yesterday. I wasn't blown away by the place, but the records are fairly graded. There's some post it notes on a lot of the records describing what they are, and they're well worth reading. One thing I didn't get - there's stickers on a lot of new records that say, "Don't break Seal or you Bought It!" on them. Do their regulars think they can just open up records and pop them on the listening station to see if they like the music first? Really? Why would people think that they could open a new record? They sell new and used stuff and I found this in the used section. I grabbed it right away, because it looks like it may never have been played and it's about the best Punk album to come out in the past decade.
Is that a lot of praise? I hope so. The Bloody Hollies are the three hardest hitting riff drivers around. Their music is like getting punched in the gut, and getting up and taking it again because it was so much fun the first time. Singer/guitar player Wesley Doyle may have the kind of voice that takes some getting used to, but this is one of those albums I've put on without telling anyone what it was just to see their reaction, and while it's divisive, if you fall on the side that likes loud, fast and hard, you'll probably love this album.
No songs on the album are over 3:30, so The Bloody Hollies don't fuck around building things up. They get right to it, find the riff, and beat it into submission. They sing about girls and being pissed off. The lyrics won't be mistaken for Bob Dylan, but they won't be mistaken for Gene Simmons, either. They fit the songs and Wesley's voice will make up for anything lacking lyrically. He means what he's saying. The main thing here is to Rock and to Rock Hard.
All the songs are top notch. Their first album, Fire at Will is good, but this album is great. Maybe it's just having Jim Diamond at the controls , but these guys just fattened everything up and made it just perfect. Gasoline is the kind of song that will get you a ticket when you're driving on a sunny day. The drums and bass are just relentless and the guitar stabs in and out of the beat and just slashes everything in sight. I'd have to wonder if they can even play another song after they play that one. The song that closes out side one, right after Gasoline, is Right Between the Eyes, and that's exactly where it hits ya!
Side two is more of the same hard hitting sonic assaults, like Raised By Wolves and Mind Control. There are no slow songs or ballads, just slashing guitars, pounding drums and bass and shredded vocal cords. I'm not exactly sure what more you could ask out of an album. I'm sure this isn't for everyone, but I think it's pretty much as good as it gets.
No comments:
Post a Comment