| Bad Religion Against the Grain |
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 | Tracklist:
1. Modern Man
2. Turn on the Light
3. Get Off
4. Blenderhead
5. Postive Aspects of Negative Thinking
6. Anesthesia
7. Flat Earth Society
8. Faith Alone
9. Entropy
10. Against the Grain
11. Operation Rescue
12. God Song
13. 21st Century Digital Boy
14. Misery and Famine
15. Unacceptable
16. Quality or Quantity?
17. Walk Away
| Ranking: #22 for 1991 | |
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On 18 Lists
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Hailing from Southern California, the band have influenced so many bands while mostly influencing the 90s punk revival. They were also one of the pioneers of the prevailing punk sound (meaning The Offspring, Green Day and such). Against The Grain is considered one of the band's unsurpassed albums and with fine reason. The songs have the ability to stick in your head for days and most of the tracks have that "wow" factor around them. This album also gave punks hope for punk in the 90s.
Bad Religion are like candy to me. They are incredibly sweet but too much and it makes you feel pale. Well maybe the band don't make me feel physically sick but when I listen to them too much it can feel samey and I then reach for the skip button. Against The Grain, the start of Bad Religion's 90s releases is the exact same for me. Most of the tracks are nearly two minutes but every one of them sounds quite the same with no variety at all besides a few songs. Unacceptable and Quality Or Quanity are identical for the first few seconds and skipping through the tracks, you begin to notice all the tracks all have a samey feeling to them. Well this isn’t the case for all the tracks, the trend doesn’t apply to a few of them and luckily enough, these ones are the best.
The songs I’m talking about are Modern Man and 21st Century Digital Boy, the finest songs on the album. Modern Man grabs you as soon as it hits the speaker, with it’s melodic lead line and Greg’s sweet vocals (and during the chorus, backed up by chants from the other band members). Instantly catchy and is sure to be the song that gets you on first listen. 21st Century Digital Boy is probably the track people know from this album (as a video was made from the song and it was re-recorded for Stranger Than Fiction). The band lead onto a pop punk song for this song, it’s very basic but god, is it ever so excellent. The chorus has enough catch to keep you in it’s web for months, the lyrics are also quite interesting especially in it’s sing-a-long chorus:
“Cause I'm a 21st century digital boyI don't know how to read but I've got a lot of toys. My daddy's a lazy middle class intellectual. My mommy's on valium, so ineffectual. Ain't life a mystery?”
One of the best bits about Bad Religion for me is Greg’s voice. He doesn’t have a voice that grains on you throughout the album and it has this brilliant rasp to it. His voice makes songs such as Turn On The Light and Get Off sound one hundred times better. I do feel the guitars and bass could have did a bit more but it’s punk so what do you expect? The songs do have some cool noisy solos or a flowing lead line but that’s all really that goes out of a basic power chord. The drums use the same beat over and over again (those who are familiar with The Offspring will get what I mean) but I can’t ask for much cause the bottom line is this is simple punk with pop traces littered throughout. It’s catchy and it’s a nice listen for a while so I really can’t complain. Though with some more variety in the music, this could be more than great.
Overall:
- Catchy punk with pop traces throughout it.
- The lack of variety in the songs can be irritating
- Hard to listen to the whole way through
- But very catchy and melodic
3.5/5
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Good job as usual these guys are a decent punk group.
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Good review. I own the re-release of this. You hit my feelings on the album pretty well, although I think Anethesia, Entropy, and the title track are all classic bad religion songs.
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Bad Religion are like candy to me. They are incredibly sweet but too much and it makes you feel pale.
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Good review. The album is kinda samey like you said except for the stand-outs (Modern Man, Anesthesia, 21st Century Digital Boy), but the album is only 35 minutes, so it doesn't bother me as much. This is my favorite Bad Religion album.
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To me, this album (and much of BR's discography) is punk at it's finest. I can listen to it in whatever mood I'm in and it's the same quality.
Bueno reivewo, my man. Bueno.
Digging: Electric Wizard - Dopethrone
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Great review sir. Too bad I'm not too fond of Classic Punk.
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Anesthesia is one of my favourite BR songs.
Digging: A Forest of Stars - The Corpse of Rebirth
| | | Album Rating: 3
It may have that classic punk label, but it doesn't have that classic punk sound, actually sounds fresh for even today.
This is a decent album, but tbqh, I got this as my first BR taste after hearing 21st Century Digital Boy. I liked other albums better though.
Digging: Bon Jovi - Crossroad | | | Album Rating: 4.5
I agree with most of the review, but this is a classic, hands-down. 90% of today's punk rock wouldn't be around without Suffer, No Control, or ATG, and the lyrics are better than most punk bands out there. Read my review of it (the remastered one) for a different take. 5/5 for me.
Digging: Them Crooked Vultures - Them Crooked Vultures | | |
I bought this album today and listend to it all and read your review could not agree more......
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