BAD BRAINS: INTO THE FUTURE (2012)
1) Into The Future; 2) Popcorn;
3) We Belong Together; 4) Youth Of Today; 5) RubADub Love; 6) Yes I; 7) Suck
Sess; 8) Jah Love; 9) Earnest Love; 10) Come Down; 11) Fun; 12) Maybe A Joyful
Noise; 13) MCA Dub.
Unfortunately, Adam Yauch was prevented from
producing the next Bad Brains album by his death from cancer in 2012.
Consequently, the band produced the album on their own — exactly the same way
as Adam would have produced it, or so they thought, dedicating the record to
his memory. Supposedly, Into The Future
refers to the future of the Beastie Boys' legacy, and maybe to Yauch's future
life and achievements in Heaven, than to Bad Brains' own future — which, by the
looks of this album, does not seem too different from their past.
In fact, by this time we pretty much have a
stable understanding of what a «late period Bad Brains album» is supposed to
sound like: a loud, clean, meticulously sanitized mix of hardcore, metal, and
reggae with a middle-age spiritual undercurrent. The latter bit seems
ineffective — I am not sure how many people there still remain to seriously care
about H.R.'s preaching: if lines like "The youth of today / Is the man of
tomorrow / They don't live in tears / Beg, steal or borrow" seem
promising to you on paper, H.R.'s grinning joker-tone may add to the promise,
but then again, it might not — by now, it is so completely predictable in its
theatrical poise that the original «mystique» is in danger of mutating to
«irritation».
The thing is — as long as Bad Brains were young
and keen on following their basic instincts, and also as long as they were
playing beyond top speed and on the verge of chaos, they had intrigue: even if
you were not wooed over by their playing style, there definitely was something
intellectually incomprehensible about their music. But now, just take a listen
to the title track. Its melody is deliberately stuck somewhere between old
school garage rock and new school hardcore, each chord polished and dusted off
as if this was an introduction to the friggin' «Well-Tempered Electric
Guitar». Except that the chord sequences hardly display any freshness or originality:
this is discipline without verve, a soul-free pro job that no longer has any
musical meaning.
Perhaps this point might be even better
illustrated by a song named ʽFunʼ — although it is about as far from any real
fun as a Celine Dion ballad. Generic thrash metal chugging alternating with
languid distorted power chords, set to a rather silly mantra ("Let's have
fun, we all need fun, and this music is fun, school is fun, love is fun")
— unless they actually think it's ironic, which it is not, this is one of the
least appropriate anthems to fun-making that I have ever heard. If you listen
to it long enough, it may begin to seem catchy, but the trick is that a properly catchy song has to catch you
with an emotion, not with repetition. And what is that emotion?
Overall, I refrain from any judgements on this
record, just like I did with its predecessor. It is formally listenable, even
the posh reggae numbers with amazing titles like ʽJah Loveʼ, but emotionally
and intellectually, it is basically just a blank, and both of the key members
are to blame — Dr. Know just seems content to sit on his legacy, and H.R.,
having said goodbye to his old madman image... is really just a Paul D. Hudson
like any other Paul D. Hudson in the London area.
Check "Into The Future" (MP3) on Amazon
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