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[X_Ray]

ok iv been a fan of against me! for a while then they signed to a recorde label and their newest cd was being advertised on mtv2.
and what with alot of preiviously great bands hopping on the emo/sell out wagon im afraid to buy their new cd in case it destroyes my love for them.
so what im asking is has any one herd it? and if so is it worth buying or what?

[squawk]

it's a motherfucking album you guys

I saw Against Me! on Conan once. They were okay!

[X_Ray]

yea album. that still doesnt aswer my question   

[squawk]

You could always just use the good ol' 'try before you buy' method, or see if they are streaming it anywhere online?

[X_Ray]

well unfortuantly i cannot download any tihing on my comp cuz my parents thought it would be cool to instal a second copy of windows on the comp and leave the old one still on. so i have about 173mb or sumthin like that. i guess i could chek their myspace tho.

[X_Ray]

well what happened was a while ago i reformatted the comp with a hacked copy of windows and it worked fine for a couple years. then when a windows up date was being installed they found out it wasnt a real copy so we couldnt get any more updates. so my parents thought it would be a good idea to reinstall windows. unfortunatly they reinstalled the new Os without deleting the old hacked copy. so whenever i start up my comp i have to choose between the hacked copy or the real copy.

any way this is kinda off topic now

[David_Dovey]

Copypasting what I said about the album on another forum:

"I think I'd really like the new Against Me! album if it wasn't made by Against Me!

To elaborate, there are a lot of incredibly well-written "pop" songs on there, but if I buy an Against Me! album that's not exactly what I'm looking for. I think Butch Vig totally fucked the production job, it all sounds way too flat and uninteresting, and there's just so many other bands out there doing what this album does pretty well, but not great.

Against Me! have lost what made them unique.

It's a god damn shame because I really wanted them to come out and kick everybody's ass after all the criticism they copped for signing to Sire Records.

Honestly, I think if this had been produced just a bit dirtier and rawer then it probably would've passed muster for me. As it is, it just feels like "porridge music."

That being said, "New Wave" and "Borne on the FM Waves of the Heart" are pretty good songs, and probably the ones that do suit the way the album sounds the best.

Edit: Brad, seriously give their old stuff a try, "Reinventing Axl Rose" which is their first LP and considered by most fans to be their masterpiece, and my personal favourite "Searching For a Former Clarity" which I think strikes the balance between the DIY folk-punk sound and well-structured accessible songwriting about a hundred times better than "New Wave" does."

---

"Yeah, but like I said, it's got a little to do with my pre-conceived notions of the album, but a lot to do with what I see as Against Me! slipping into a style that is done by so many other bands, and much better at any rate. If this album didn't have Against Me's name on it, I doubt I would've paid it any attention at all."

That being said, after making those comments I decided to give the album another chance and I think it's growing on me a bit.

[rhinohelicopter]

I actually just listened to some of it today in a record store and it seemed really uninspired.  I'm not all that into Against Me! though.  I wouldn't care if somebody put it on in the background but, it's not somthing I would actively listen to.

[valley_parade]

Dude, just get it. Great album.

[a pack of wolves]

There is no worse band in the world worse than Against Me! It's one thing to be a bad band. There are a lot of those. It's not that bad to be a band that loses its touch and starts releasing lacklustre or bad records. It happens, and you can always go back and listen to the records from when they were still great. But to be a band that not only starts to release terrible records but also actively shits on everything they once stood for and that made their music what it was... that's truly unforgivable. Because the band then not only becomes dire but it also destroys any enjoyment of the old material. I don't know anyone who still listens to Reinventing Axel Rose or As The Eternal Cowboy. They've been rendered meaningless, the songs devoid of any passion since the band have shown they never really meant it. And a punk record where the band don't give a shit really is a waste of space.

[Kai]

It was okay. The songs were genuinely alright but nothing spectacular. I think switching some of the tracks around might have helped (The Ocean was not the song to end the album on, I think). I've never liked Butch Vig's production; it is always pretty glossy and nasty and while this isn't as bad as Nevermind, it does range from "completely bland and unnoticable" to "totally obnoxiously clean".

But that's just me. I like music when it sounds like shit.

Overall though, it does have one good thing going for it.

It wasn't Searching For A Former Clarity.

[a pack of wolves]

I sense great anger in you, young padawan.

I could be worse. A friend of mine's written about 5 songs on the subject of deeply despising Against Me!

[KvP]

Didn't the lead singer get arrested recently for assaulting somebody in a bathroom?

[valley_parade]

I think you're confusing musicians and senators.

[Freezey]

Didn't the lead singer get arrested recently for assaulting somebody in a bathroom?

Apparantly it was for smashing a head into a coffee table.

Cue the songtitle jokes - "Smash Unreal", "Pints of Guiness Make Me Smash", "The Disco Before the Smackdown" etc.

As for New Wave, I really did want to like it but over half of the songs just degenerate into filler after a listen or two. Not to mention "Animal" is by far the worst song they've ever penned. There are a few good songs on it though, so see if you can give it a listen before deciding to buy or not - I'm sure most large music stores would have it set up in a listening station.

[BrittanyMarie]

Reinventing Axel Rose or As The Eternal Cowboy.

Listen to them out of context and they're still really good, though. Can you elaborate on how they never meant it, please? Admittedly, I'm out of the know when it comes to them after Searching for a Former Clarity (which sucks) but I am a little confused by what you said.

[X_Ray]

searching for a former clarity wasnt that bad. it had a really popy sound which suked but like iv always noticed people geting started on against me from listing to songs like miami, and unprotected sex with multiple partners. but it was still a good cd it just suked compared to reinventing and eternal cowboy.

[Kai]

Cue the songtitle jokes - "Smash Unreal", "Pints of Guiness Make Me Smash", "The Disco Before the Smackdown" etc.

http://www.mitchclem.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=15678&highlight=tom+gabel

There were some great ones over on the Nothing Nice boards.

"Scream Until You're Coughing Up Blood (Because Tom Gabel just beat you up)" is my personal favorite.

[Freezey]

Yeah, there were a ton on the punknews.org story about it as well. Probably a lot of crossover. I also liked the lolcats Tom Gabel picture.

[a pack of wolves]

Reinventing Axel Rose or As The Eternal Cowboy.

Listen to them out of context and they're still really good, though. Can you elaborate on how they never meant it, please? Admittedly, I'm out of the know when it comes to them after Searching for a Former Clarity (which sucks) but I am a little confused by what you said.

But it's impossible to hear them out of the context of them being Against Me songs (for me anyway, since I know who wrote them).

Basically, Against Me! used to write songs about DIY and anarchy. Then they signed to a major label, started charging a small fortune for their gigs which were put on by big time promoters, therefore no decent supports but plenty of bouncers to mash people up. None of that's anything a band who actually believed in DIY or anarchy would contemplate doing so it's impossible for me (or anyone else I know who likes punk rock) to find any depth in their back catalogue anymore. In short: "if you're not now you never were".

All of which really pissed off a lot of people. For one thing, people in DIY resent all their hard work being used as a stepping stone to getting a nice big fat paycheque from a major label. That's not why we do it, there's a lot of hard work involved and it's not so we end up acting as unpaid PR for the 'next big thing'. As Red Monkey put it, "counter culture, not subculture". DIY isn't for people who can't get record deals, it's for people who don't want record deals. And bands like Against Me! doing what they did can give people the impression that DIY's just some little playground, a place for bands that haven't made it yet and probably never will but secretly all really want to. Which is bloody aggravating.

And unfortunately for the work of Against Me! it was the political stance of their records that gave them depth and made them interesting, all of that singalong anger and love for a better way of doing things. Without that what's left? Some catchy music, sure, but it leaves a dirty taste in the mouth because of the memory of what that song used to be capable of bringing to mind and the knowledge of what it's been reduced to now, a pale shadow of its former self. I took a look on their myspace before to see what the new songs sounded like. There was a call to action against the IMF and World Bank listed... right below a post urging people to tune in to Letterman. Pathetic.

[BrittanyMarie]

Thank you! I see what you mean, but now I just keep wondering how they are justifying this to themselves.

[a pack of wolves]

It is a puzzler. It's not like they were stuck on a label with exclusively underground distribution or something. They were on Fat Wreck, anybody who wanted their records could easily get hold of them and I'm sure Fat has plenty of resources for things like supporting a band on tour.

[edgyswingsetacid]

man, even the records they put out on fat wreck were terrible. against me getting big and all that is old news. it happens everyday. all i know is it's kind of satisfying that as soon as it happened, they stopped writing good music. sure, something good has been consumed by something bad, but at least we got it while it was at it's best. surprisingly though, there was one good song on the new album.