Boy, do I like the punk rock music. It has a special place in my heart, being the teething ring of my distant-past musical awakening. Before I was converted, my taste was pretty, well... let's just say "tepid." I went from Billy Joel to Dead Kennedys in the space of a summer. You want to talk about an exhilarating change in worldview? Try digesting "Chemical Warfare" after thinking that the hardest-sounding thing in music was the Stones' "Midnight Rambler." Luckily, I was shown the light before any permanent damage was done. (Thank you, Doug Ruby, wherever you are).
Prolific, underground vets Scared of Chaka (Land of the Lost, not Ms. Khan) are like a big, punk rock sloppy joe. The trio plays a mix of greasy, gearhead garage-rock spiked with generous doses of So-Cal punk (both old and new schools) and gritty Detroit proto-rock. At their best, Scared of Chaka can even favorably evoke sentimental favorites like the Dead Kennedys ("Permission to Die") and the Dead Milkmen ("C'Mon, Look Out"). At their worst, they play some very familiar (and consequently, contemptuous) three-chords-and-a-bullet style of fast, hard rock. You've heard it all before, though some of it may be worth hearing again.
Marvelously, the 14 tracks fit into 26 minutes. Whip out your slide rules: at an average of 1:53 per, the songs barely have enough time to elicit either a satisfied smile or a grimace of disgust. But they occasionally do have the punch to work, despite their time constraints. The anthemic "I'm Atomic, Baby" opens the disc aggressively, with short bursts of raw guitar accentuating blurted, distorted vocals. Three chords, three choruses and out the door. The tempo barely dips on the follow-up jab, "Why Are You Weird?" with its hyperactive offbeats and a killer melodic bridge.
But after a strong, fast start, Crossing with Switchblades slogs through a relatively tame and boring midsection. On much of the album, the guys get by on fury and attitude as much as on song quality. Unfortunately, there's no such thing as slow, measured fury. Nor does fury have a pop sensibility. Heaping on the irony, you even get one track with a sound very derivative of a band who are themselves derivative: Weezer. At least, I think it's irony...
For all its faults and unevenness, Crossing with Switchblades succeeds on a certain straightforward, no-bullshit level-- a level refreshingly free of any pretense or sophistication. In that sense, this album does nothing more or less than remind me of my earliest musical passion. I do still love the punk rock, and Scared of Chaka tries to play it like it was meant to be played: with string-shredding speed, a tinny treble gouache and demonic howling in lieu of singing. And all delivered with a sincere "fuck you" attitude that's contagious enough to make you want to kick someone in the head. Which is exactly what I went and did. (Sorry, honey.)
