Friday, January 18, 2013

Review: FIDLAR - FIDLAR


"Listening to them you can tell they did their homework on punk rock" is what FIDLAR's label Mom & Pop writes in the label notes, "Any given song will give you a Germs influenced guitar solo, the catchy 'Ooo's' and 'Ah's' of the Misfits, and lyrics in the same family as Black Flag's 'Six Pack' and 'TV Party'. On the same token they can just as easily be compared to any of the bands they cover (Blink 182, FEAR, CCR, Warron Zevon), yet it all comes across entirely their own: Surfier, Faster, more fuzzed out, more personal and a lot more drunk." Yes, obviously all of these reign true and are apparent when listening to FIDLAR, but, in all honesty, does that sound interesting?

When first listening to single "Cheap Beer" months ago, I was excited about FIDLAR's debut album would sound like, with the single's abrasive vocals, production and shredding guitars. So here I am now, in January, listening to that album, and boy am I disappointed. Initially, I would just like to point out that January was quite possibly the worst time to drop a surf rock album. With song titles ranging from "Wake Bake Skate" and "Max Can't Surf" I feel like I should on the beach while listening to them, but instead most of us are cooped up inside with snow falling outside. More importantly, the album just feels unnecessary, bland and unoriginal. From track one to track fourteen (fourteen? really?) the album brings literally zero new ideas to the table and each track seems like it could have been a b-side or outtake from a past Ty Segall or Wavves album. Sure, the songs can be fun at times and I'm sure the live show is a blast, but it just seems unnecessary in this day and age for another garage punk/ surf rock band from San Diego. 

There's a fine line between, "Hey, wanna go over last night's homework?" and "I forgot to do that homework, give me the answers." and FIDLAR seems to have taken the easy route here. With bringing no new ideas to the table, FIDLAR's debut effort seems like more of a stale, outdated rehash of our already favorite garage rock groups that we still, to this day, enjoy. Maybe they should have never opened the garage door during practice, because it seems the world is already over FIDLAR.

4/10

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