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Versione 1
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Let's face it, Blackcocks is a bit of a letdown. Musically, the most bitter disappointment of my first year at university. Because yes, Strung Out have (had, but you never know) always had that problem: the jewel of the ultra-technical pop-punk triumvirate with Pulley and Ten Foot Pole, the five from Simi Valley have always alternated good albums with mediocre works, unable to restrain their catchy spirit, often squandered in episodes that it is euphemistic to call kitsch.
Blackcocks is part of the so-so works, that's clear. With an aggravating factor: it has a tease-like soul. It shows it to you but doesn’t give it to you.
Let me explain: May 8, 2007. The first single, "Calling," is released, making you drool. Double pedal, technicalities, Bad Religion-esque epic in thrash chrysalises. "Finally, here we are," exults the twenty-year-old me, "the perfect balance between melodic hardcore and metallic onanisms, without the gaudiness of Exile!" Then if you roamed the net, the hype was erupting: "Blackhawks Over LA: SO embraces extreme metal", practically a beast halfway between Celtic Frost and a marine raider. At least according to Punkadeka.
In short, rivers of excitement.
But.
June arrives, the month of truth.
I remember a terrible afternoon: I expected another 13 Callings (if not Carcass inexplicably loaned to punk rock), but instead, I find myself with a tame, poppy, perfectly ordinary disc. It opens with "Calling", of course, which promises you the world: in my opinion, their best song ever. Then all the others compete to disappoint expectations even more. Oh well, the title track and "Party in the Hills" still hold up pretty well, but then there’s emptiness.
A nondescript series of pop-punk stylings as fresh as canederli. Mere self-citation of the excellent albums that ten years earlier had decreed their rise: the surprise effect is missing; solutions stumble, worn out by the pachyderm weight of déjà vu. Zero creativity. Just take number 5, with its prepubescent swagger and the chilling one-hit-wonder chorus, seems digested and crapped by Bowling for Soup.
The débacle is partly attributable to everyone, even to that Jordan Burns who, although somewhat lackluster live, had always been impeccable in recording. Here, often, the rhythmic solutions don't convince: the hefty drum fills of "Dirty Little Secret" marry badly with an innocent little nursery rhyme that would feel tight on New Found Glory; in "The King Has Left the Building", the alopecic drummer manages to spoil the only metal riff of the lot with a cutesy and overused mid-tempo making A Day to Remember sound believable.
But no doubt, the number one culprit is Jason Cruz. Bored with the vocal lines and the writing of the lyrics, he loses himself in the (supposed) myth of himself, mired in a perpetual 1998 and a hypothetical "Matchbook" on loop. Twenty years pass for everyone, my dear Canadian: you can't talk about geopolitics in a track only suitable as a soundtrack to a foam party ("A War Called Home"). You can't come up with a vocal line so sloppy as to throw away all the good expressed instrumentally by "Orchid". Furthermore, badly imitating Paul Di Anno. But above all, you CANNOT significantly contribute to creating that duodenal sound abortion known as "Downtown". Here, I won’t even try to describe "Downtown". It’s like when you fall into the abyss. You don’t describe the abyss. You can’t, you don’t manage. You describe the strangled terror dragging you towards the inevitable.
So it is with "Downtown": it can only be described by its sadness, its purulence, the auditory leprosy it evokes. Roughly speaking, it seems like a 69 between Paolo Limiti and Floradora, but in 4/4.
In short, with this release the Strung Out leave a nice skid mark on their underpants (and if it wasn’t for "Mission Statement", they would have totally flunked): top gaudiness, bland lyrics: why all this pondering on current events, guys? You're much better at talking about vampires, alienation, and exhumation of girls (yet another side effect of the Bush administration: a compulsion to talk politics, spontaneity at historic lows, and albums a bit so-so. It's no coincidence that The Empire Strikes First was anything but perfect).
A bit more humility and reflection wouldn’t hurt. Had they made just one album between Exile and Blackcocks, Strung Out, we would have a masterpiece in our hands. Instead, pacta sunt servanda and Fat Wreck, evidently, is more major than it wants to seem.
The foreskin of national Fatty speaks clearly.
Tracklist and Lyrics
01 Calling (04:19)
The wings that take this sparrow break with this weight of mine,
another message lost into the void of time,
Is anybody out there get the message that I send?
Would anybody read it then send it back again?
A call to mend connection lost through memory and bone,
A call to find a new way to communicate and grow!
Now I sold my voice to pay for my security
now I write my sentence on its walls
I'm calling, is anybody out there?
Is anybody tunning in?
One thousand years that Ive waited for a sign
A dream may last for seconds changing you for all times
Frantic incoherent just a reach in the dark!
a message for my lonely thoughts a sparrow for my heart.
I'm calling, is anybody else out there?
Is anybody listening? Can anybody hear me?
The wings that take this sparrow break with this weight of mine,
Another message lost straight from this heart of mine
A message out to anybody tunning in that this whole world is slowly caving in!
04 All the Nations (03:03)
04 ALL THE NATIONS (3:03) In London, in Brooklyn By the side of the road in the rain It's simple in this ghost town Another set of eyes breaks me down again I know there's something going on with my perception I see the same face in every new direction And every set of eyes tells me something I know about myself But never seem to wonder This breaks my heart, each time I see the woman I don't know And all the nations tell me is we're all the same way In Berlin, in DC Going south on a cocaine train A church yard, a back yard Keeping on till we find our way home again To all of the nations And two light towns In the airports and gutters The eyes shout all the same This breaks my heart, each time I see the woman I don't know And all the nations tell me is we're all the same way Together we go through it all and We've seen it all and we're going nowhere In life we can never try to break us down and Get along Together we sing along In life we'll never be alone In life we'll never be alone Let's celebrate the space that keeps us from ever getting in From ever getting in This breaks my heart each time I see the woman I don't know And all the nations tell me is we're all the same way Together we go through it all and We've seen it all and we're going nowhere In life we can never try to break us down and Get along
09 Downtown (04:08)
09 DOWNTOWN (4:08) Tonight, I feel you comin down I feel you coming over me like broken glass Fallin down to cut my dreams Now if these walls could only talk They'd say no more than I can say here with a grin A bottle and Saint Anthony My thoughts are turning on me now And the pace with every footstep takes me farther down The dark end of the street that you call home Confessions, stories, chances left behind All show thier faces in every stranger that I find There's something you don't wanna know There's something I don't wanna say Transmission on the radio No direction no way home There's something going wrong with us There's something broken in our eyes Caress the emptiness and pour another drink And wash away these memories These dirty walls with gasoline The faces here dont have a thing to hide They tell the story of every broken heart survived There's something you don't wanna know There's something I don't wanna say That if we make it out alive There's more to life than to survive There's something going wrong with us There's something broken in our eyes Tonight I feel you coming over me Tonight I don't wanna feel a thing Now we never ever planned to go this far Now we never thought that it would get this dark There's something you don't wanna know There's something I don't wanna say Transmission on the radio No direction no way home There's something going wrong with us There's something broken in our eyes
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