ADOLESCENTS: PRESUMED INSOLENT (2013)
1) The Athena Decree; 2)
Conquest Of The Planet Of The See Monkeys; 3) Forever Summer; 4) Riptide; 5) In
This Town Everything Is Wonderful; 6) Big Rock Shock; 7) Dissatisfaction
Guaranteed; 8) Presumed Insolent; 9) Broken Window; 10) 300 Cranes; 11)
Snaggletooth And Nail; 12) Daisy's Revenge; 13) TicTac At The Alligator Tree.
Two years later, the Adolescents are back and
their formula has not changed half an inch. There is a new guitar player (Dan
Root) replacing an older guitar player (Joe Harrison), but who gives a damn?
The Adolescents were never known for individualistic styles of guitar playing.
What matters is that the album is even more
monotonous than its predecessor, and offers the listener an even harsher retro-encapsulation
of the band's classic sound that you thought was possible — one of the most
rigidly conservative «rebel» albums I've ever heard.
The sound is every bit as pristine and exciting
as it used to be, but this time around, the songs are really glued together — same length, same tempo, same chord
patterns, same mood for each of these thirteen numbers. Worst of all, the
production is muddier and more muffled than it was for Fastest Kid, so that the guitars rarely sound as «crisp», and the
vocals are diffused in the mix and lack proper rousing power. The basic aural
impression is a rather «sludgy» one, and no matter how much of an effort the
band makes, the songs never make me want to clench my fist like ʽKids Of The
Black Holeʼ used to do.
A few of these numbers have power-pop potential
that is never properly realized — I think that ʽBroken Windowʼ, for instance,
could make better use of its vocal melody, had Tony bothered to record his
voice more prominently, or had one of the guitar players bothered «coloring»
that tone a little differently. But the thing is, they are still operating on
this «strictly spontaneous» basis, where too much seasoning is supposed to
spoil the broth — a mistake, because times, brains, and attitudes have changed well
enough since 1981 to allow this «spontaneity» to be tinged with genius. Within
these thirty-two minutes worth of music lies a perfectly palatable power-pop
EP, with a running length of 15-20 minutes; all they had to do was give
themselves a little more time and a little more sophistication to get it out of
their system.
But no, this is «hardcore punk», pretending to
old glories, and now it doesn't even have the comeback excitement of Fastest Kid, let alone the fact that
each of these songs probably took five minutes to write. The song titles look
appealing — ʽTicTac At The Alligator Treeʼ is one of my favorites, regardless
of what it is all about (the words are predictably undecipherable throughout,
and hunting for lyrics to hardcore punk albums is not my favorite cup of tea) —
but the emotional punchline is always the same, and fully predictable.
Consequently, as much as Fastest Kid was a pleasant surprise, so is this quickie follow-up a
major relative disappointment, a stern exercise in «purism» that can only
appeal to the band's original bunch of devotees — 45-year old geezers for whom the
ideal adrenaline rush has been permanently defined as a concentrated blast of
speedy Californian punk, regardless of how much effort or talent went into it.
Alas, a thumbs
down.
No comments:
Post a Comment