v/a "Black on Black: A Tribute to Black Flag" compilation CD
[Initial]
Originally released as four limited edition 7"s (all out of print), now we have these songs on one handy CD: Nine fairly popular bands covering the almighty Black Flag. American Nothing (formerly called American Nightmare, now called Give Up the Ghost) leads off with a pretty straightforward hardcore/punk take on "Depression". Aside from a little noisy lead work and the scathing vocals it's pretty much to the point. "Life of Pain", as performed by Anodyne, is more discordant and raw with some heavier moments and burly vocals, definitely darker in feel and true to the Black Flag aura. Burnt By the Sun sounds like a totally different band than usual doing "Drinking and Driving", working with a more spacious and dry, biting sound they seem to be holding to the integrity of the song without neglecting to add their own twists. Next up is Coalesce. Newsflash: I hate Coalesce. I've never been able to get into this band. About the only thing that could possibly make them sound good is covering "Jealous Again", and while I would rank this as one of the better songs I've heard from the band, they still manage to ruin certain portions of the song... it has its moments, but I don't know, I just can't seem to appreciate these guys at all. Converge takes on "Annihilate This Week", and aside from a pretty crushing rendition of the chorus, it's crap - I'm surprised to say. The blasting speeds are especially annoying due to the rugged and overly distorted recording, they drag things on and on for over four minutes with too much saturated feedback and noisy, chaotic mess. The chorus fucking kills, but god damn, other than that this is easily the worst song on the "tribute". The Dillinger Escape Plan suffers a similar fate with "Damaged I & II": The production is ass and they drag on for too long. It's raw as shit and has no clarity whatsoever, sounding like it was recorded with one mic in a muffled room with shitloads of dirty distortion everywhere. They don't even sound like themselves, but unlike Burnt By the Sun they don't pull it off - not even when they suddenly throw in some jazzy clean guitars and shit out of nowhere. They take more liberties with the latter portion of the track, throwing in some electronic beats and such, but it doesn't save the painful mess that preceded it. The Hope Conspiracy finally comes in to save the fucking day with a killer cover of a classic tune... "Nervous Breakdown". Awesome stuff. Lots of raw distortion, like many of the other tracks, but they keep things simple and throw their influences into an otherwise standard cover. Both "Police Story" and "Wasted" are handled by Planes Mistaken for Stars in one brief track, but I'm relatively unimpressed. They do things pretty much by the books but they're just sort of annoying... I don't know, they do a good job with "Wasted" but I think they ruin "Police Story". Playing Enemy closes out with "Six Pack" and proves as always that they're a fucking destructive band, as their rendition is the only one on the entire fucking CD that truly morphs the song into their own style without making it unrecognizable. It's sinister as fuck and heavy as hell, but still unleashes a mix of tempos and plenty of gritty texture. I love the simplicity of the layout. It's mostly black, white and gray, but the center spread has a row of tiny color photos and brief information regarding each participating act. There's also some subtle metallic silver ink, and most of the imagery used as backing textures is pretty abstract. Inside the booklet are also some liner notes about the release written by one of the guys from the label, recounting his first Black Flag experience and tying it in with how the participating bands each represent some of the same things as Black Flag to him in relation to the hardcore/punk scene. There are two distinct problems with this compilation: First and foremost, too many of the bands seem to have felt the need to use more primal than usual recording techniques, and not only does that not make sense, it makes the songs suck; and secondly, this CD is way too damn short. They should have added on some additional tracks that weren't released on the original 7"s, because this thing doesn't even hit the 30-minute mark. I don't know, you've got five tracks that range from very good to really fucking cool, and you've got four songs that pretty much eat it hard coming from bands that could easily do better... Not bad, but for my money Black Flag deserves a better tribute. (6/10)
Running time - 28:46, Tracks: 9
[Notable tracks: American Nothing, Anodyne, Burnt By the Sun, The Hope Conspiracy, Playing Enemy]
Initial Records - http://www.initialrecords.com

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