#470 Bad Religion - Against the Grain

Lists lists lists, they give me albums to listen to - following up on Suffer.

Very little music really wants you to dislike it. Sure, punk, noise, experimental nonsense of all kinds, it wants them to hate it, but it wants you, the listener and fan, to like it, even if its only because it is so thoroughly offensive to them. And that them-offensiveness is the appeal of a lot of punk, the aggression and non-conformism and its general defiance of good taste is what makes punk punk (and is the core of what post-punk carried over the border). But what if you, the fan, also likes melody and hooks and, well, good songs? Punk wouldn't want to be so enjoyable as to be broadly appealing - that way lies selling out, so a series of compromises and slides up and down the scale take place, especially during the 90's punk revival, when rock had learned plenty of tricks to tempt bands down the pleasant scale to sellout land.

Bad Religion does a pretty darn good job of this actually. They're repetitive and angry, full of shouting and noise, but all that energy is directed skyward instead of into the mud. The bass sputters Bad Brains fast like a lakeborne retriever, the guitars chug and turn, and the vocals just soar. That's really the signature Bad Religion trick, those downright excellent harmonies that act as release of each song's frustrations, that are that moment your plane leaves the ground elsewhere bound. It's all pretty pop, though not as quite as 21st Century Digital Boy* would lead you to believe. I found myself listening to it quite a lot actually, smoothed out without being boring, enjoyable for me with just the barest touch of 90's level anti-themism to give it a bit of texture, and blistering by with some downright old school 1-2 minute song lengths. And those harmonies 4.5/5

You might like this if: you want some darn good pop punk, hovering right around Dookie in terms of accessibility, but well short of Blink 182.

* I never noticed the line at the end of that song that changes the hook to "21st century Schizoid Boy", confirming the title's King Crimson reference. Neat.