Review Summary: Attention! This album might cause development of Warrantophobia.
Last time we talked about Warrant, their most mature album,
Dog Eat Dog, was under discussion. But not all was well in the state of Denmark. Despite good reviews, the LP enjoyed less popularity compared to the band’s previous releases. Jani Lane, their leader, even quit for a short while, looking for a successful solo career, but returned soon after that. Around the same time, two other founding band members (lead guitarist Joey Allen and drummer Steven Sweet) left Warrant, so when work on another album started, new people were involved. Once again, seasoned producer Beau Hill was called in, and in November 1994, everybody headed to the studio. In March 1995, a new album from the updated Warrant was released, named
Ultraphobic.
For whatever reason – be that financial considerations or, maybe, artistic assumptions – the band decided not to continue in the direction indicated on the previous record. Instead, another course was taken toward the sound in vogue at the time – alternative rock, or more specifically, its Seattle version. At least, this is what is heard after you press ‘Play’.
The first three tracks are done according to the rules of the genre. A simple but heavy and gloomy riff? Check. Songs about violence/lies/betrayal, etc.? Check. Lyrics include the obligatory words like ‘pain’, ‘hate’, ‘broken’, ‘wasted’? Check, check, check, and check. Vocals filled with anger, rage and angst? Boy, and how! So, basically, these tracks are your run-of-the-mill grunge. The band industriously reproduces all the clichés, giving the impression of blatant and hollow imitation, which, in turn, replaces any kind of positive response on the part of a listener with boredom and barely repressed yawns. Standard rhymes like ‘rain – pain’ or ‘eyes – lies’, and such lines as
‘We are on our own / We all die alone’ or
‘But with a knife I call the truth / I sever ties and cut me loose’ definitely contribute. Verses like that quickly became bread-and-butter for the ‘Seattle Four’ copycats, and more often than not, they sounded insincere. Though it should be noted, the main riff and vocals on
Followed have certain energy, and the song doesn’t leave the listener indifferent regardless of its musical and lyrical banalities.
On the fourth track, the trend begins to change noticeably.
Sum of One feels like an attempt to mix pop metal and grunge, but with poor results. Starting with the fifth song, the band drops every intention to imitate popular tendencies and reverts to the 80s rock and its respective standards. That’s why the second half is filled with ballads about unreliable girls, relationships coming to an end, and typical cuts on newly found love – in other words, it is a definitive transition to the sound which brought the band popularity back in the day. However, for some reason or another, all these songs are performed with such indifference that practically nothing catches the ear. Only a couple of cuts there have at least some distinguishing qualities: a bit faster and a tad more rocking
Crawl Space and
Ride #2, a decent but unnecessarily protracted song about a ‘rebel without a cause’ type.
Live Inside of You also comes to mind but only because of funny lines ‘
In your mouth, in your mind / In your body from behind’. Whatever that means.
As you can see, Jani Lane, who earlier tried to make the songs interesting (and whose strongest tracks were based on pretty good narratives or some effective atmosphere), regressed on
Ultraphobic and returned to topics and ways which even he dabbled in before. There are no more choirs, or orchestral accompaniments, or anything noteworthy at all. Pop hooks are lacking, making the new songs uninspiring and forgettable. Without a doubt, it is a big step backward for Lane. And, for that matter, the same can be said about the new guitarist – completely unimpressive.
Yes,
Ultraphobic underwhelms, and as a follow-up to quite effective and solid
Dog Eat Dog, it even disappoints. Chasing after the popular sound, Warrant released a very mediocre album which contains nothing with a quality above average. Even though the record is not impossible to listen to, there is no desire to come back to it after the first and only play-through.
