Review Summary: Have some Advil close by...
I bought "60 Second Wipeout" on Amazon a few weeks ago. I was browsing for related bands to Fear Factory and KMFDM, and this album was in the 'Customers Who Bought Items in Your Recent History Also Bought...' section. I clicked on it and found a brand new one for only a penny. I decided 'What the hell, I might get what I pay for'. A week later, It came in the mail all in mint condition. I walked back to my house, ripped it to my computer, and put it on my iPod (This is usually the process I go through when I buy CD's). I put in my earbuds and played the first track, "Revolution Action".
My earbuds gave out two and a half minutes into the song, and instead of being p!ssed, I was amazed. Being a fan of punk music and electronic music, Atari Teenage Riot are now easily in my top 10 favorite bands.
This album combines the elements of punk, breakbeat, gabber, and noise/glitch music to create ear-damaging music that ironically makes you want to turn it up even more untill your ears bleed. Hanin Elias' sceams, and I mean legit screaming, Alec Empire's and Carl Crack's yelling, and Nic Endo's- err, noisemaking, are top notch and with the clean studio production makes this album louder and clearer than "Delete Yourself!".
"Revolution Action" kicks off this album with a bang, being introduced with a top-of-the-lungs scream from Elias. You'll need to get used to that because she does that in almost every song, showcased in songs such as "Western Decay" and "U.S. Fade Out". Too bad her voice was damaged and soon departed from the band from this. "Atari Teenage Riot II" Is exactly what the title claims, this song picks up where the original "Atari Teenage Riot" track form "Delete Yourself!" I can't really pick which version I like better, but I always lean towards "Atari Teenage Riot" because it was three and a half minutes, and in the end has you quickly put it on repeat. The second version is six minutes long and has a prolonged ending that kinda gets boring and has you skip to the next track after Empire says "F*ck You!"
What makes this album great is the noisefests in this album. The only way to explain "Digital Hardcore" is to pictue that Alec Empire had a backing track of a basic ATR track, but Nic Endo decided to mess with it in the middle for a over a minute. What makes it bad... is also the noisefests. While, "Digital Hardcore" is a cool track, it also makes you wonder why the hell your listening to this. It's just a bunch of noises from a computer that has gone bezerk... then again its still awesome!
"Ghost Chase" is the most breakcore sounding track on here that has a killer keyboard riff. but is sort of weak compared to songs such as "Revolution Action". Speaking of the latter, "Revolution Action" is one of the highlights of the album, sporting a very ridiculous music video (I recommend everyone to check it out on YouTube). My only problem with this song is that the song after it, "By Any Means Necessary", is just a continuation of the song. For me it's really hard to listen to either one of these songs without the other.
One of my favorite track on here is "Too Dead For Me", Having the right amount of noise and yelling in it. "Western Decay" is alright i guess, its one of Atari Teenage Riot's slow songs that still packs a pretty good punch, but it drags a lot in the middle of it. The only thing that has me listen through the whole song is Elias' screams in the second half of the song. I could only imagine how long she lost her voice after recording this song, let alone the album. "Death of a President D.I.Y" and "Your Uniform (Does Not Impress Me)" to me sound like songs that didn't make "The Future of War", but are still cool tracks.
"The Virus Has Spread" is a rather pointless filler track that serves no purpose to the album. "No Success", the albums amen-break abusing track is another filler track, but is worth listening to. The album closes in what is my opinion one of the most agressive song on here (besides "Death of a President D.I.Y"), "Anarchy 999", is another one of my favorite tracks which uses every element from this album, including the sped up hip hop drum loops, Hanin Elias' high pitched screams, and Nic Endo's noicescaping to make another assult to the eardrum that you blast at full volume... until you get a massive headache and turn it down and take an asprin.
"60 Second Wipoeout" has been ranked number 23 in Kerrang!'s Top 50 Heaviest Albums Of All Time and I can clearly see why. Though this album is not as 'heavy' as it is 'loud', but then again, the list includes such albums as The Beatles "White Album". If you are a fan of Atari Teenage Riot, you should already own this album. If you are new to ATR and need a starting point, I'd say either start here or with "Delete Yourself!" .Though this album is not so accessible, and half of it is a bunch of noise, this album still kicks ass!
Key Tracks:
Revolution Action/By Any Means Necessary
Too Dead For Me
Death Of A President D.I.Y
Anarchy 999
