Saturday, July 26, 2014

Don't Wait Up

Five years ago, Bane released a couple of 7 inches that revitalized my love for the band. I'd forgotten how great they were, and those records served as a nice reminder.

There was a lot hype when it was announced that Bane was releasing a new album this year. I'm still confused if this actually a "final album" or not.

When the vinyl went up for pre-order, I was like, "Yeah, I'll just wait until release day, and order it then."...then it sold out. Fuck. I was scrambling to find it anywhere, searching every online distro trying to get my hands on a copy, but I came up empty at every turn. Release day came, and I vowed that I wasn't going to sink to the level of buying the CD. I also didn't want to find a free download. When I heard it for the first time, I wanted it to be when I dropped the needle on my turntable. So I waited.

I was glad to see that the wait wasn't too long before REVHQ started taking orders for the second pressing. 700 pressed on white vinyl.

So how is the album? Man, it starts off with a bang. The first two songs really deliver, and I can't believe how incredible this sounds...then comes Calling Hours, and everything comes to a screeching halt. Look, I love David Wood and Down To Nothing, and Pat Flynn and Have Heart...I can even hang with Rotting Out every once in a while...but when you throw those three as guest vocals on one song, everything sounds so disjointed. Then by the time the female vocals come in at the end, I'm like "Get me the fuck out of here". Sorry, but I don't dig it at all. I won't dwell on the negativity though, because right after that song, we get back to what Bane do best. Solid album from dudes that have been doing this for a long time. Well done.

1 comment:

mcs said...

Kinda funny that I now have six copies of this LP, but somehow you manage to pick up a version I don't have!

That song 'Calling Hours'... I thought the same as what you have written on the first couple of plays. It's too long, it's disjointed, the different vocalists sound bad mixed together, etc. But then I started to like the female bit at the end, and listen to it to get to that bit... and then I started to like the rest of it. I now think it's the best song on the record. It's so 90s too. Love it.