The Bomb: Speed is Everything

The Bomb: Speed is Everything

2009

No Idea Records

Format I Own it on: Vinyl

Track Listing: 1. The Kids  2. Holiday  3. Not Christmas Night  4. The Rescue  5. Haver  6. Space Age Love Song  7. Integrity  8. A Song For The Helenas  9. Spaceman  10. Speed Is Everything  11. Blown Away



Naked Raygun is one of my favorite bands, however I've always felt that they had a couple of problems:

1. Their albums are often very inconsistent...Mind-blowingly awesomely melodic songs sitting next to jokey filler or industrial-noise grinds...Don't get me wrong, I usually enjoy the jokey songs and the industrial noise grinds, but often find myself wishing they would have put out just one killer, filler-free album of  nothing but those glorious "Whoa-hey-ho" songs...Despite the bad reputation it often gets, "Raygun...Naked Raygun" is my go-to Naked Raygun album simply because it has the highest ratio of pop-punk anthems...



2.. When I recommend a Naked Raygun album to someone, I often toss in the caveat, "But whatever you do, do NOT look at the lyric sheet..." It says a lot about the high quality of their instrumentation and vocal melodies that I can forgive their often poor lyrics...Although, I will say, even though their lyrical skill was questionable, their subject matter was always interesting...Often containing a sci-fi, comic book or cyberpunk bent that I love...



 Anyway, Naked Raygun fizzled out somewhere in the early 90's and I've always loved the spin-off band Pegboy, whom I felt corrected the problems I've outlined above, but sometimes at the sake of NR's uniqueness...They were much more consistent, but their highpoints could never quite reach Naked Raygun's peaks because their vocalist wasn't as distinct or unusual as the always-interesting Jeff Pezzati (who routinely stumbled onto true greatness)...

Anyway, I was listening to Naked Raygun one day and wondered whatever happened to Jeff Pezzati...I had heard awhile back that he had formed a band called the Bomb,  but I had never listened to it...I was at the record store and ran across a copy of  "Speed is Everything" and picked it up...

If you disagree with my assessments of Naked Raygun's weaknesses I've listed above, then I'd say skip The Bomb...Just stick with "All Rise" and "Jettison"...They're classics...Agreed...But if you ever wished that Naked Raygun put out albums of nothing but "Home of the Brave"s and "Soldiers Requiem"s then I can't recommend "Speed is Everything" enough...This fucking thing rules...

  Every single song is good...Even the A Flock of Seagulls cover works and fits in well in the overall scheme...I can definitely detect a healthy dose of wounded New Romantic melodicism in a lot of these tracks ("The Rescue " and " A Song For The Helenas" in particular) and remember those industrial grinds I was kinda complaining about earlier? Well, "Haver" fits that definition, but they improve the formula by tossing a big Woah oh oh in the chorus which instantly makes it more palatable to me...See? Imagine if "Peacemaker" had a big "Woah oh oh" for a chorus...Way better, right? But mostly the album just sticks to speedy punk rock with huge, sweeping melodies..It's hard to pick a favorite...I might have to go with the entirety of side two, especially "Spaceman" which puts a bittersweet spin on Jeff's often sci-fi/fantasy-themed lyrics...A long look at that sci-fi/cartoon obsessed guy as viewed from the disapproving eyes of a girlfriend/wife..."Integrity" is another highlight...Just good, slamming punk that would have sounded brilliant on any NR album...Oh, and the lyrics are mostly fine...I mean it's not Bob Dylan or anything, but this didn't pull too many winces from me (I'd still avoid the lyric sheet though)...

 If you look closely at the vinyl, there's an etching on the run-out groove on side two proclaiming, "The House That Woah Hey Ho" Built...Which is  a great way to explain this record...It's just Jeff Pezzati doing what he does best...Singing soaring melodies over tough punk rock with zero bullshit clogging things up...He sounds freaking great by the way...Better than ever...It's hard to remember many other old school punks delivering albums that are arguably better than their classic albums...A huge achievement and if you like melodic punk rock even a little bit then you'll love this..There's no way I'm not going to check out the rest of the band's discography immediately...

Here's "Spaceman" by the Bomb...Enjoy...