They're bad, they're back and they're still mad as hell and still not gonna take it any more. Sweeping through everything before them like fallout from a squillion-megaton nuclear warhead, Zack de la Rocha and his merry band sandblast the wax out of your eardrums with "Sleep Now In The Fire". Whirlwinding round a mighty riff that Satan could strap on as a prosthetic and split pigs with, "Sleep Now In The Fire" is under the impression that the revolution is already here, and is happily lining up politicians against the wall and gunning them down. The music industry needs bands like RATM to remind itself that sometimes - just sometimes - music can mean more than something to cop off / get pissed / jump around to. Now whilst you could still happily do all three to "Sleep Now In The Fire", it nevertheless takes the music industry and shoves a fist down its throat until it chokes.
A couple of live tracks recorded in Mexico City follow. "Guerrilla Radio" is more piledriving polemic political rock rap funk, and manages to conjure up a miniature moshpit in your living room. "Freedom" is sadly not the Wham song, but is instead a nine-minute (almost - whisper it - prog) epic that stalks through the suburbs at night in camouflage gear and a Che Guevera t-shirt.
The excellent video to "Sleep Now In The Fire" completes the package, and features RATM playing live in front of the New York Stock Exchange, whilst bemused traders, pissed-off policemen and mad-for-it kids look on, unable to stop the barricade-destroying detonation of that riff.
They're still not gonna do what you tell them.
Rating: 9/10
The Rest
Proof - if any was needed - that Richard Ashcroft was The Verve. Strings drip, guitars jangle, and old tousle-haired Ricky croons his way through an unashamedly old school indie love song. "We're gonna make it tonight, there's something in the air tells me the time is right, so we'd better get on", he warbles as melody flirts with rhythm to sire the kind of song that Luke Haines would be proud to call his own. Not as majestically grand as "Bittersweet Symphony" or as plaintively affecting as "The Drugs Don't Work", "A Song For The Lovers" is still charmingly attractive and immediate, and shows that Ashcroft still has much to offer.
"(Could Be) A Country Thing, City Thing, Blues Thing" is more introspective of mood; sounds chiming off each other, stopping to politely apologise then fading away into nothingness. "Precious Snow" is probably the best track on the whole single however - an innovative and shining concoction full of vocal "cha-cha"s, straining guitars and a rhythm that would have Swiss watchmakers crying into their cogs with envy.
The whole has a tone of optimism and lightness that The Verve often overlooked in their quest to be epic, and you sense Ashcroft might just maybe now be enjoying himself...
Rating: 8/10
No one on this earth (not even Britney) has had such a fruitful relationship with pop than this crew. Not since those heady days of the Spice Girls' height (ah, I remember it well...) have a group managed to grasp the charts so effectively and shake it until their golden nuggets rise to the top where they so rightfully belong. "Deeper Shade Of Blue" is - like most of their other singles - hard to fault within its sphere, being perfectly packaged, executed and presented. Too perfect, perhaps, but hey - this is the world of Steps we're talking about: bad things simply don't exist there. Harmonies skip around a big bendy maypole of a song as the band sing a Just-17 photo-story transcript over a chugging handbag house beat. What more could you ask for?
If you answered "two remixes, please", then you're in luck. The "W.I.P. Mix" is first, but merely appears to have turned up the beat a bit. The "Sleaze Sisters Anthem Mix" is next and is far more like it, being a gloriously camp, cheesy and hedonistic rush to your poperogenous zone. You know you love it.
The single claimed also to have the video on it, but I'm damned if I could find it. However, I have seen it so often on MTV that it has burned into my retinas anyway, and the lack of the frankly bizarre Thunderbirds / S&M fest will not cause me to lose too much sleep (even if it does feature Lisa done up like the 152nd Pokemon).
 |
|
Gotta catch 'em all...
|
Rating: 8/10
Basement Jaxx may be a bit more credible than Faye, Lisa and the rest, but the bottom line of what they do amounts to the same thing - a whole lot of fun you can shake yourself around to without having to engage your brain. This tasty Latin-hued cocktail of horns, beats, pianos and vocal samples goes straight to your head like a bottle of Tequila, and has the advantage of not making you sick on the carpet afterwards (unless you're really unlucky). Still not as downright enjoyable as Les Steps though...
"Choo Choo's Apple Jaxx Mix" follows, parading the song through a midnight Mardi Gras on Mars. "Jump N Shout (Shanton Warriors Mix)" comes along next, and is a characteristically schizophrenic Jaxx mixture of beats and sounds, this time on a bit of a ragga tip.
Rating: 6/10
Imagine if the Pet Shop Boys had grown up a bunch of homophobic arseholes, raised on a diet of cheap beer and pornography. You know this one by now ("You and me baby ain't nothing but mammals, so let's do it like they do on the Discovery Channel" - oh stop, my sides...), and it is as annoyingly crass and unfunny as you thought it was. Inane, offensive without being dangerous or interesting, musically dull...please take it away and shoot it.
Next is "Why's Everybody Always Pickin' On Me?". Because you're a tediously boring song. Next?
Mercifully last is "Boom". Mercifully also it is slightly better, riding a sportz-metal wave back from whence it came.
Bloodhound Gang make Blink 182, Offspring et al look like a bunch of university professors. Funny old thing, the US sense of humour can be, eh? (No, not very often)...
Rating: 1/10
|
