Having long been a fan of Rage Against the Machine since my angry but misguided days as a teenage burglar/ self proclaimed revolutionary I was very excited and intrigued to hear of Morello's solo work. Hearing that it was folk inspired effort got me even more excited. I had always liked Bob Dylan, Johnny Cash, and The Band and the thought of Rage's socialist guitarist pursuing this route gave me a raging boner in my pants. So I hopped on the net and in true Rage Against the Machine, illegally downloaded the album off of a torrent website.
The opener, "California's Dark", had a decent Springsteen meets Guthrie feel to it. The follow-up, title track "One Man Revolution", was also a good folksy tune that any Marxist dissident could raise his fist to. The highlight of the album though was "The Road I Must Travel". An Americana influenced story of a lone radical, performed the vein of classics such as "The Weight" and "The Ghost of Tom Joad" is enough to give even the most conservative of listeners the urge to wave red flags and chuck molotovs at cops.
Unfortunately, after the promising start the album begins to bleed together and sound the same. "Union Song" and "Garden of Gethsemane" have their moments but ultimately the albums earnestly and bland Grapes of Wrath based metaphors becomes a bit much. Disappointing? Yes. Lucky for us though Rage is back together. |
