Review Summary: I'm da joker, baby
In the music video for lead single “Vilified”, Cuba Gooding Jr. -yes, the guy from Snow Dogs- holes himself up in his apartment while police gather outside, shouting at him and taking cover despite no crime being visibly discernable. It’s hinted that his character is antisocial and egged on by the perverse and depraved plot of the 2019 Joker movie due to the vocal samples of the song which plainly state just that, and Art of Anarchy themselves are performing on that movie’s iconic staircase. Don’t worry though, this story has a happy ending: the power of love heals all when Cuba’s daughter breaks through the police barrier to hug her dad and stop him from, well, it’s still not exactly clear. But there’s a ripping guitar solo tailormade for a Guitar Hero 3 boss battle and a chorus about being painted insane for merely standing up for what’s right -“the clowns and fools, forever enslaved yeah”. To quote the great Joaquin Phoenix in his twisted jester role, “you wouldn’t get it.”
Art of Anarchy are a love letter to the hard rock of yesteryear composed of tertiary characters from that Affliction-adorned amber age. After going through two Scotts -Creed’s Stapp and Stone Temple Pilots’ Weiland- the non-Slash guitar player from Guns n’ Roses and the Brothers Votta are joined by Jeff Scott Soto to gesture to all the tropes and trappings of rock in the Wal-Mart graphic t-shirt sense, with weedley solos and vague allusions to freedom and love and fighting for what’s right. I have a strong intuition that the less I read into their words, the better. That being said, I do have to tell you that “Echo Your Madness” has the line “your judgement’s constipated/your mind is clouded steel.” Sure, why not. Hell yeah.
Let There Be Anarchy lies in a Mariana’s Trench depth of the generational divide and levies a full-blown audio-assault by way of a sound and scene that has aged as well as its rockstar icons have. To the geriatric boomers, this probably works as a full-throated reclaiment of Real Music thanks to the pervasive presence of Real Instruments and actual, honest-to-god guitar solos. To everyone else, it operates more on the level of a Da Share Zone meme where a scythe-wielding skeleton tells you to invest meaningfully into a Roth IRA. It is a profoundly silly and low-stakes affair that is undeniably entertaining as such, even if that was doubtfully the intention. Much as Art of Anarchy would like, nobody is gonna start a
Let There Be Anarchy review with “I had never seen a shooting star before” and that’s probably a good thing.
