Bluetip
Join Us
»
Bluetip
Join Us
Dischord, 1998
RiYL: Dismemberment Plan, Burning Airlines, Cheap Trick, Foo Fighters |
Musically, Join Us makes field trips to numerous D.C. touchstones, from the vein-popping vocals and thick riffs Robbins unleashed in Jawbox and Burning Airlines, to the spastic and groovy movements favored by Dismemberment Plan. There's a palatable Cheap Trick aftertaste to the rip-roaring twin guitars on "Cheap Rip," while the no-nonsense intensity and weirdly catchy, elastic melody of opener "Yellow Light" (these guys hit the chorus within 17 seconds!) recalls the finest work of early Foo Fighters.
And although the songs do sometimes seem beholden to these influences, Join Us still has a leg up on the bevy of faceless post-punk outfits that continue to clutter the racks. There are some interesting deviations from rock-you-into-submission mode, particularly subtly psychedelic winners such as closer "Slovakian." Atop craftily shifting chord progressions a la Shudder To Think, Farrell numbs himself to the lows of touring ("I want to piss on every continent" / "anticipate tomorrow's headaches and soften my nerves") with the realization that "it's yesterday back home." Elsewhere, the instrumental "Cold Start" gives a banjo and an electric guitar equal time to work through the same bendy riff.
While his melodic range is limited, Farrell's sung/spoken lyrics leave songs such as "Castanet" and "Cheap Rip" open to a myriad of interpretations without cliches. Indeed, Join Us seems to constantly teter between reluctant happiness and I'm-a-fuckup overanalysis. "Yellow Light" sums up the dichotomy best: "again today / things just barely went my way / and it's the happiest I think I've been in a long time."
The air-guitar gem "Castanet" touches on personal issues that Farrell hammers home with lines such as "if I miss you, I can still do a damn good impersonation," and at song's end he's rendered an insomniac, with only Cheap Trick records to remind himself of what once was. In "Cheap Rip," the poor guy can't even send off a letter without cursing himself for his lack of skills: "limited vocabulary / to fabricate robotics and tenses / emulation of a human emotion / the sentiment sounds about as real as a Speak And Spell."
The thing is, Farrell's sentiments do sound real, adding the human element to Bluetip's powerful post-hardcore. There's nothing revolutionary about Join Us, but its 12 songs may make you wonder why you didn't jump aboard the first time around.
JONATHAN COHEN | Jonathan Cohen co-created Nude As The News with his Indiana University mates Troy Carpenter and Ben French. When not traversing the globe for business and pleasure, he holds down the fort as a senior editor for Billboard in New York. Stop him and he just may ask, "what for lunch?"