Gary Steel
GET DOWN TO the fat, heavy packaging of this deluxe edition. Thrill to the included fabric patch, and especially the natty combo of surf wax comb and bottle opener.
It’s pretty transparent which audience they’re shooting for here, and I guess it’s also contingent on swigging vast amounts of everyone’s favourite taurine-enriched, caffeinated lolly water. Which is where the music comes in, I guess.
When Aaron Bruno (who for all intents and purposes is Awolnation) was offered free time in LA’s Red Bull studio, the result was this 2011 album, which somewhat inexplicably resulted in Platinum sales. Listening to it three years on, there’s a big sonic hole at the centre of this music that no amount of sub-Rage Against The Machine vocals can cover up.
Red Bull are famous for their support of electronic dance music, but this poorly fitting colour clash between angry rock, Euro trash keyboards and robot bonking rhythms just doesn’t cut it.
The hybrid works somewhat better on the extra disc, on purpose-built songs like ‘Thiskidsnotalright’ (purpose built for a computer game, that is), and on the much more musically pleasing remixes. But really, who in this world could possibly need five extra versions of their horrid hit, ‘Sail’? GARY STEEL
RATING:
2.5/5 stars
