BAD RELIGION: STRANGER THAN FICTION (1994)
1) Incomplete; 2) Leave Mine To
Me; 3) Stranger Than Fiction; 4) Tiny Voices; 5) The Handshake; 6) Better Off
Dead; 7) Infected; 8) Television; 9) Individual; 10) Hooray For Me...; 11)
Slumber; 12) Marked; 13) Inner Logic; 14) What It Is; 15) 21st Century (Digital
Boy); 16*) News From The Front; 17*) Markovian Process.
Another year... The only generalization that
can be generalized about this record has already been made in the All-Music
Guide review: Bad Religion sign up with a major record label and, in order to
convince the fanbase that this is not a sellout, try their best to come up with
an «authentic» BR record, dumping all the variety of the previous two albums.
That is as correct as they come: Stranger
Than Fiction is all tense, all fast, almost all a stylistic clone of Suffer. Whether this is good, bad, or
who-the-heck-cares is a different thing. In a way, Bad Religion might be like
AC/DC — it's very easy to get sick of the formula, but nothing else seems to
work as efficiently. Change and perish, always stay the same and prosper.
For tactical reasons, the band re-recorded ʽ21st
Century Digital Boyʼ for this album — now that they had a larger distribution
base, re-releasing their most famous song seemed like the right thing to do.
According to one of the versions, they were forced to do this by the people at
Atlantic who wanted a hit single and saw no potential in the rest of the songs.
Were they right or were they wrong? Well, let's just take a look at these other singles.
ʽInfectedʼ, the album's slowest and «grandest»
number, starts off with a few blasts of feedback that almost sound like a
pompous brass introduction — then chuggishly builds up towards a
look-at-me-suffer chorus. It is the only song here that would not seem fit for
their late 1980s albums, and for a good reason: it sounds like a boring
post-grunge teen-angst anthem — not even graced with another set of Graffin's
intellectualized lyrics: "You affect me / You infect me / I'm afflicted /
I'm addicted / You and me" is not exactly the most inspiring chorus in BR
history.
Third single was the title track: London Calling-style punk-power-pop
here, upbeat, martial, lyrically rich — and not catchy in the least. You know
something's not right when the song's idea of «catchiness» is to insert the
word "obituary" in the empty musical space between the chorus and the
next verse. It's not even shocking.
And the fact that "Life is the crummiest book I ever read / There isn't a
hook, just a lot of cheap shots" is not something I'd be willing to take
for an excuse. Even if that is true, it does not mean that art has to follow life
in everything. I, for one, did not start listening to Bad Religion for any
«cheap shots».
That leaves us with the fourth single, and it
is the only one worthy of close attention: ʽIncompleteʼ is probably the best
song on the album, just because the tough, passionate start — "Mother!
father! look at your little monster, I'm a hero, I'm a zero, I'm the butt of
the worst joke in history" — is overwhelming, the best shot of inspiration
on the album. This is classic Bad Religion stuff: anti-social ranting, well
constructed lyrics, speed, fury, hatred, madness, and wisdom.
There are quite a few other songs like that on Stranger Than Fiction, scattered here
and there — ʽTiny Voicesʼ, ʽThe Handshakeʼ, ʽIndividualʼ, etc. — but there is
also quite a bit of stuff that goes easy on the hatred, or the lyrics, or the
speed, or the fury, and that's bad, because it does not add much to the album's
general feel of diversity, yet makes it less intense and cutting-edge than the Suffer-era trilogy. And the very fact
that they had to re-record a much earlier song to stimulate interest in the
album is quite telling.
Check "Stranger Than Fiction" (CD) on Amazon
Check "Stranger Than Fiction" (MP3) on Amazon
1994. The year that Therapy? released the successful album Troublegum. So I invite everyone to compare the opener Incomplete with that other opener Knives. Then tell me which song is "all tense, all fast", which song displays more hate and self-aversion. For me that's a no-brainer.
ReplyDelete"well constructed lyrics"
Yeah, I don't think thát applies to Andy Cairns to a great extent.
Honestly, I can't think of a more ultimately generic, boring, group than this one. Even Stone Temple Pilots had the off-stage Weiland drama to keep fans awake. But this group? The only thing I can remember about them is their theft of the Black Flag logo font. It doesn't get more pathetic than that.
ReplyDeleteWhat? You're crazy. Infected is easily the best song on here
ReplyDelete