Fed Up - Fuck Your Life CD (United Riot)

DOA once defined hardcore as not backing down from what you believe in, not giving a shit about what the maintstream society thought about the scene, not giving a shit about phoney fashions and putting rebellion back into rock. If that is the case, then this is a decent stab at hardcore. New York band Fed Up return to the old school punk to deliver 16 angry tracks in just over 25 minutes. True, it's somewhat let down by the production, as some of the tracks sound like they`ve been recorded in a dustbin at the end of the garden and you have to crank up the volume on the CD just to be able to hear it above the sound of your own heartbeat. However, it is refreshing that there are still bands out there who do not kotow to the major record companies who these days seem just to want to serve up polished turds to show on MTV and stick in glossy magazines. `Fuck Your Life` is anything but glossy. This is heavy duty `Fuck you` old school punk with attitude. Some of the songs' lyrical content about `tetas` and `butts` is a bit tiresome and should be left in the school playground, but the angry and defiant rants against terrorists, street justice, and about the everyday struggle of muscling through life comes to the fore. `Gonna Get Yours ` spits out `You blow up our planes, you think its alright, spineless wimps you`re in for a fight, fuck you and your stupid cause, you fuck with us now you gonna get yours`. Make no bones about it , this isn't straight edge or pretty boy punk, this is streetcore. The whole concept of this album seems to be one of defiance, I just wish that they`d reassess their values and be more definitive in what they are actually rebelling about. They tell us in `Fed Up` that they are `Fed up with this fucking shit, Fed up with the stupid pricks, Fed up with the politics, It just makes me sick`. Well….what exactly is that about? Criticism aside, this is a decent offering of testosterone buzzbomb snarling rock. Bands like Agnostic Front have laid the path for other bands to follow and I can`t help thinking that `Fed Up` have to raise the bar to stay in the ballgame. They are more than capable of delivering the goods and have laid down a solid base on which to build and develop. Fed Up are the equivalent of a musical car crash waiting to happen. This album owes much to the original hardcore bands from the early 1980s such as Iron Cross, Black Flag, Youth Brigade, SOA, and is well worth a listen if you can put aside the dodgy production.
(By Justin )