The Nervous Return –
Wake Up Dead (CD)
Sound: B-
Music: B-
The first album of a given band is always interesting
because you know that band will not stay that way if they move on and they are
not as polished, but the sophomore efforts can sound like a rough first album
and The Nervous Return’s Wake Up Dead leaves that impression once you
have heard it. The album has been
getting good press. They have even
toured more than many such acts would get to do so early on and have opened for
the inarguably great No Doubt.
With that said, the album is purposely rough sounding
technically and material wise. They are
doing some degree of Punk, a genre so many generations down that even Green
Day’s American Idiot can only be considered so bold, while there may be
a bit more New Wave here than any critic (or the band?) might want to
admit. The songs are:
1) Dramahead
2) Siberian
Queer
3) Red
Camaro
4) Murder
Weapon
5) Wake Up
Dead
6) So &
So From Such & Such
7) It’s Not
Enough
8) Hate
Song (For Animate Objects)
9) Skin
Flavored Lollipops
10) Radiate
Good Rock music is allowed to be dumb, but some of the
tracks here are just not as good as they could have been. The crux of the problem comes when the songs
address human sexuality. Siberian
Queer seems more like a gay bashing song than one about observing
homosexual oppression, while Skin Flavored Lollipops is not as
interesting as the title suggests. If
they can develop this further, they have the musical talent to become a
formidable act, but this is their gleaming handicap and I could care less about
the rave reviews otherwise.
The PCM 2.0 Stereo is good enough, but is again purposely
raw. Fortunately for them, some of the
material and a majority of the musicianship can back up the attempt at
authenticity. It is one of the more
interesting listens you will have this year if you like rock music of any
kind. That is even if you consider any
Rock since the 1980s Post-Rock or this Post-Punk.
- Nicholas Sheffo
