VARIOUS ARTISTS
Double Shot Punk (K-Tel)
Reviewed by Jason Thornberry

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K-Tel is back in the fray with this double cd, a "Double Shot" of punk rock, easily the most worn-out, beaten to death, tired genre in existence. Disc One opens with the fantastic Bad Religion doing "21st Century Digital Boy," a sing-along they re-did for their Stranger Than Fiction cd, and the last that Epitaph label-head played on as a member. This set showcases what's good and stinky about punk in general. It has really good (Old School) songs, like that Bad Religion tune, the featured bands X, Black Flag, Agent Orange, Richard Hell & The Voioids, The Descendents, a metal-free version of Suicidal Tendencies, and The Stooges. Unfortunately, for every yin, there's a yang, and for every good "real" band, you get some absolute shite outfit, like Zebrahead, doing the already-played-out Ska-Core-With-Interspersed-Bits-of-Rap. Less Than Jake hopped on board the ska-core bandwagon, and rode it with The Suicide Machines (it's all up-stroke guitars and piccolo snares to me) to its logical conclusion as a "flavor of the month." The Vandals, on the other hand, were re-born, and are just as boring and predictable now as when they started. Civ and The Living End both helped illuminate my issues with the punk scene. Civ does the wannabe pop-core thing for "Can't Wait One Minute More" (remember the video?), and The Living End threw that groggy punk-gallop beat over ascending guitars. The exact same way it's been done for years. Snore. The one surprise from this whole haphazard collection (this is hardly a definitive "punk" collection) came from Gang of Four, who I, unfortunately, hadn't heard much of in the past. The eighties. When my youngest brother was still in diapers. Before he got a MohawkT, and started putting glue in it.

3/10

[Pick this up at cddiscounters.com.]

© 2002 - Jason Thornberry