by stip
Well we’ve heard our first officially sanctioned performance of material from the new record. The band plays it to death and it reminds me of the Real Me cover from the Who tribute. There are some cool guitar tones and Matt and Jeff propel the song along at a breakneck speed. It’s an upbeat punk rave up without the sensibilities Mike usually adds to them (i.e.—no blistering solo in the middle, instead, we have a little unhurried playing at the outro which contrasts nicely with the speed of the rest of the track and gives it a powerful urgency a faster piece might not have had)
Eddie is a bit questionable here. It’s hard to say if it is him, since he sounds like he’s singing his heart out, or if it is the mix, but he sounds faint—so it is either poor mixing or he’s just out of breath. If it was the later they probably should have picked a slightly easier song. What was really striking about the performance was how removed Eddie was from it. It’s rare to hear PJ without having the songs being carried/dominated by Eddie, and this was not his song. I suspect this is indicative of the mixing only because he sounded so great on the terrible bootlegs of The Fixer circulating right now.
I’m reluctant to judge the lyrics as Comatose sounded deceptively simple in the early versions that circulated, but once we heard a clear version that turned out to be one of the smartest and most lyrically compelling songs on S/T. given how hard it is to really hear Eddie here I want to withhold judgment until this is a single
Overall this struck me as an inconclusive debut. I was a little underwhelmed here but I was really excited about the terrible copies we’ve heard of The Fixer, and with a stronger vocal take this could be much stronger. Either way this certainly was no 2000 Letterman Grievance, and I can’t imagine this one going down in the canon as one of the legendary moments in the bands live history.
The discussion continues here ...
