NOFX "Wolves In Wolves' Clothing" (Fat Wreck Chords)
Will NOFX ever end? It's a valid question on this, the band's 11th (?) album. The band has released absolute punk classics like 1992's White Trash, Two Heebs And A Bean, and 1994's Punk In Drublic. They have spurned countless major label offers to stay indie. NOFX founder "Fat" Mike runs one of most successful and consistent indie punk labels in Fat Wreck Chords. NOFX was one of the first punk bands that I got into. So, it pains me to say that it might be time for the legends to hang it up.
Wolves in Wolves' Clothing sees the band continuing their fast-paced melodic hardcore/pop-punk hybrid. Not much has changed over the years for the band except the songwriting has become more and more inconsistent. Wolves in Wolves' Clothing contains some great NOFX songs. "We March To The Beat Of Indifferent Drum" sounds like it could have fit on NOFX's classic The Longest Line EP. "The Marxist Brothers" is a nice slower-paced song with the band's trademark ska riff burning in the background. The band has jumped into the political arena over the last few albums and that continues here on tracks like "USA-holes" which attacks the Bush administration and "Jesusland" which throws a few humorous jabs towards the red states.
Too often though, the material just does not measure up to band's earlier great heights. It seems that NOFX is content to pump out an album every few years and isn't really concerned with pushing their boundaries at all. I guess that's fine though…I think I'll always find a few songs to love on any new NOFX record. Frankly, I think the band has earned the right to do whatever the hell they want by this point.
RIYL: Green Day, Screeching Weasel, Bad Religion
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I cant believe that NOFX is still releasing albums…They must be pushing 45 at this point…I remember buying White Trash, Two Heebs and Bean 11 years ago at a record store that no longer exists. And they weren’t a new band then. I love them, but you are right…its the same material over and over again, with the new stuff paling in comparison to the old. I give these guys credit for hanging in, but its hard to be punk in middle age.
Green Day was the first punk band I heard, and then I moved on to NOFX and harder shit from there. I have about half of their albums and it seems like as time pasted they got softer sounding and more political, which is something I’m not crazy about. I still like their stuff though, but I’d like to see them put out one more album with the coarse, hard-ass sound that made them great.