Okay, I admit it, the album’s cover art is what got me interested in Russian Spider Dump, the new release by Adolescents. Like most people in this country, I have been unable to turn away from the horror show in the nation’s capital. The last four years have been a total mess, and the recent election, though having the outcome we needed, taught us that there are more than seventy million assholes in this country, which is depressing as hell. So I was ready and eager for some solid, angry punk directed at that racist prick and all the pathetic sycophants who have their tongues firmly inside the scoundrel’s filthy ass. On Russian Spider Dump (a great title, by the way), Adolescents don’t give us new material that directly addresses our current troubles, but rather reach back to choose covers of songs that seem to work really well for our strange and troubled time. Adolescents are a hardcore punk band that formed in southern California, and most of the bands they choose to cover here are also from southern California, including The Dickies, The Humpers and Germs. This is the first album Adolescents have released since the death of bass player and founding member Steve Soto in 2018. That leaves lead vocalist Tony Reflex as the only remaining original member. The rest of the band is made up of Dan Root on guitar, Mike Cambra on drums, Ian Taylor on guitar, and Brad Logan on bass.
What better way to open this album than with a song titled “Fuck You.” This song is by The Subhumans (the Canadian band, not the British band), and is one that should be blasted into Donald Trump’s prison cell for as long as the bastard remains alive. “We don’t care what you say/Fuck you.” That’s followed by a good cover of Germs’ “Lion’s Share,” and then The Dickies’ “Just Say Yes.” You might recall Nancy Reagan’s ridiculous “Just Say No” slogan during the so-called “War on Drugs.” Well, here we have “Just Say Yes,” a song that obviously plays on that slogan. Yet it itself carries an anti-drug message, with lines like “You’re the very reason why they call it dope” and “Waiting by the phone for a new kidney/Wishing it didn’t hurt to take a pee.” Then we get The Dils’ “Class War.” You know, it no longer seems like class is necessarily the thing dividing us, particularly as some of the poorest people threw their support to a man who has a gold toilet, for fuck’s sake. What is up with that, America? But the song still packs a punch. Wouldn’t we all love to see Trump Tower come tumbling down? By the way, D.O.A. also covered this one.
The Flyboys are a band I’m not all that familiar with. They were one of the early southern California punk bands, and here Adolescents choose to cover their “Crayon World,” which was released as a single in 1979. It’s a good song, some of the guitar work reminding me a bit of the Buzzcocks. That’s followed by “Dirty Bomb” by The Dragons, another band I don’t know much about. They were another southern California band, but active mainly in the 1990s. This song is from one of their last albums, Sin Salvation, released in 2003. This track really rocks, mixing punk and hard rock elements. Then, from Red Kross, Adolescents cover “Pink Piece Of Peace,” an exciting track that moves quickly. That’s followed by a cover of The Humpers’ “Fast, Fucked And Furious,” another track that seriously rocks, one you are going to want to furiously dance to. “Here is a clue, if you’re curious/We’re fast, fucked and furious.” This is a wild and energetic rendition, one of my personal favorite tracks on this disc.
The Toxic Reasons’ “God Bless America” begins with the guitar playing a bit of “America (My Country ‘Tis Of Thee),” then it kicks in with a delicious force. This is such a great song, full of anger and energy, and Adolescents do a fantastic job with it. This song has some excellent lyrics, such as “God bless America, the suicide rate/Now there’s a way out, ain’t that great” and “We got a missile for every day of the year/God bless America, this is God’s country/Land of the free, home of the slaves.” I also love that this song refers to New York City as “the asshole of the world.” This is another of the disc’s highlights, and one that feels just exactly right for our time, and one I just want to blast wherever republicans gather, scare them back into their bunkers. That’s followed by another of the disc’s best tracks, “Home Is Where,” a classic hardcore punk number originally recorded by The Middle Class. I fucking love that bass. Some lines really stand out now, particularly “This is someone else’s dream” and “Home is where we hide.” Then we get another classic punk song, “I Like Drugs,” this one by the Simpletones. This one has kind of a playful vibe, like in the way the backing vocals echo the word “loser” after the line “Everyone tells me that I am a born loser,” and in the song’s main lines, “I like drugs, I like drugs/Don’t ask me why, don’t ask me why.”
The most striking and surprising choice of covers on this album is Spirit’s “I Got A Line On You,” a rock song from the late 1960s, and not a punk song at all. And apparently, this was the song that got this whole album started. According to the disc’s liner notes, the band started playing around with this song a few years ago. I suppose one thing that makes this song fit is the fact that Spirit was a southern California band. Anyway, Adolescents’ version has a tremendous amount of energy, as you’d expect. That’s followed by “Not Going Back Home,” a song originally done by F-Word, another southern California band, and one I don’t remember listening to before. And then we get a great rendition of “Not With You,” originally recorded by Electric Frankenstein in the 1990s. This for me is another highlight of the disc. The album concludes with a strong version of Muletrain’s “Back Door.”
CD Track List
- Fuck You
- Lion’s Share
- Just Say Yes
- Class War
- Crayon World
- Dirty Bomb
- Pink Piece Of Peace
- Fast, Fucked And Furious
- God Bless America
- Home Is Where
- I Like Drugs
- I Got A Line On You
- Not Going Back Home
- Not With You
- Back Door
Russian Spider Dump was released on both CD and vinyl on October 23, 2020 on Cleopatra Records.
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Nice analysis, my friend! Hey from Brazil!
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