 |
Gob
Foot in Mouth Disease
label: Arista
released: 04.01.03
our score: 2.5 out of 5.0
|
Isn't it in
the nature of any angry rebel to send a new message to people?
GOB whines, sometimes even about other whiners, and the contradiction
makes everything catchy about their album just tiresome. They
borrow the same old musical formula from other successful punk
bands reaching back to the '80s, from Offspring to Green Day to
Sum 41. The heated attitude and dirty socks they sport are a witless
attempt in an album full of witless attempts.
Kicking off
the album are pop-punk songs like "I've Been Up These Steps"
and "Oh! Ellin," with a lot of the guitar licks and
vocal sequences matching many other artists currently working–yes,
that's why it's a cheat instead of homage. It's not a surprise
then that the songs were produced by Mark Trombino, also orchestrating
the success of Blink 182 and Jimmy Eat World. He has a flare for
what people will bob their heads to, but these Gobsters should
cultivate their talent into creativity with a little more effort
and a lot more courage.
Exciting lyrics
can do a lot, but Gob doesn't recover with interesting words to
contrast everything else. Their lyrics are simple and they often
reword the same message sentence after sentence for the sake of
carrying on for a short but thankful three minutes. Even worse,
the choruses are almost always anything but memorable ("Oh!
Ellin what can I do? / There is nothing aside from you / Oh! Ellin
what can I lose?").
On a more
positive note, there are small moments when Theo and Tom's singing
is nearly authentic. In "I Hear You Calling," the vocals
are almost charming, in a punk cliché sort of way. Theo
has charisma, and when blasting out together, the bandleader duo
has an emotional power (granted, of course, that one blocks out
the words they're singing).
In the end,
these Canadian punks haven't much of a leg, or "foot,"
to stand on. Their material is recycled; they keep it safe and
the songs get radio airplay. They have become quite successful
in their native country and Arista is definitely pushing their
album. But at their current state, Gob will never be remembered,
neither as a one-hit wonder nor as a daring band. Their lyrics
don't have the energy to be Blink 182 and their music is too
worn to be truly noticed.
03-May-2003
7:46 PM
If you
liked Foot in Mouth Disease...
|
| Tracklist:
1. Lemon-Aid
2. I've Been Up These Steps
3. Oh! Ellin
4. I Cut Myself, Too
5. Fed Up
6. Ming Tran
7. When Life Gets Boring...
8. Give Up The Grudge
9. Bones
10. This Evil World
11. I Hear You Calling
12. Bully
13. Cold Feet
14. Everybody's Getting Hooked Up
|
|
|
|
