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| Propagandhi - Supporting Caste | Propagandhi – Supporting Caste
Record Label: Smallman
Release Date: March 10, 2009
Ever since the addition of excellent bassist Todd Kowalski in place of so-so Weakerthans songster John Samson, Propagandhi has been unstoppable. Today’s Empires / Tomorrow’s Ashes and Potemkin City Limits were straight-to-the-point, concise statements with no room for improvement anywhere. In a time where 90% of punk bands could cut their album in half and I wouldn’t care, this is saying something.
Supporting Caste follows closely on the heels of the last two awesome albums, coming off as sort of a blend of the two. The mile-a-minute blastbeat and riff of “Incalculable Effects” recall Empires’s “Ordinary People Do Fucked Up Things” in all of its chaotic glory, while “This is Your Life” nods more towards Potemkins’s more straight-forward hardcore songs like “Impending Halfhead”. Neither one sounds like a rehash of past glories, either – only a familiar mood, perhaps.
As always with Propagandhi, specific fragments of songs/lyrics tend to stick around in your mind for hours, days, weeks – you’ll be singing along to bits that don’t even make sense as refrains, like “As the soldier’s inexplicably repel!” and “This incessant pressure for her to not defy!”, and you’ll be doing it long after the album is over. That’s how Propagandhi works – they jam long blocks of text into irresistible vocal lines, so that when you read the lyrics sheet you tend to say, “Oh! That’s what that is.”
There are occasional lighter moments here than on the last couple of releases, such as “Potemkin City Limits” and “Human(e) Meat (The Flensing of Sandor Katz)”. New guitarist and fourth member David “The Beaver” Guillas may be the key to this shift in influence, but maybe not. The listener is reminded of Less Talk, More Rock, where Propagandhi wasn’t quite as fire-and-brimstone musically.
Still, most of the CD is pretty pissed off. You can take the animal out of the wild, but you can’t take the pissed off out of the Propagandhi.
Supporting Caste packs all the thrills of Today’s Empires and Potemkin City Limits – it lives up to the high standard Propagandhi have set for their listeners, a standard most punk bands would crumble beneath. It’s an album that won’t just engage you: it’ll hang on to you, demanding to be the only album you listen to. These guys are incapable of any less.
Read My Interview With Bassist Todd Kowalski!
http://www.absolutepunk.net/showthread.php?t=916432
Recommended If You Like:
The last two excellent Propagandhi releases, A Wilhelm Scream, Born Against
Judge For Yourself:
www.myspace.com/propagandhi |
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Displaying posts 1 - 15 of 43. |
08:29 AM on 03/10/09 | I didn't think I liked it at first, but it grew on me fast...real fast. Almost every song is catchy as hell. Nice review, but calling John Samson "so-so" is blasphemy. | | |
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08:32 AM on 03/10/09 | love this album/band.
good review! | | |
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08:35 AM on 03/10/09 | yeah, what's with this Samson so-so talk?
but yeah, this album is amazing. can't get enough of it. Without Love is already one of my favorite songs ever | | |
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08:45 AM on 03/10/09 | Caffeinated Consciousness yeah, what's with this Samson so-so talk?
but yeah, this album is amazing. can't get enough of it. Without Love is already one of my favorite songs ever |
Seriously. Less Talk-era Propagandhi and the Weakerthans are awesome.
So is this band in this incarnation as well, though. I neglected to check out the album stream on Myspace, opting to wait until release day. I'll be checking this out tonight. | | |
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08:57 AM on 03/10/09 | I didn't think I liked it at first, but it grew on me fast...real fast. Almost every song is catchy as hell. Nice review, but calling John Samson "so-so" is blasphemy. |
This and
yeah, what's with this Samson so-so talk?
but yeah, this album is amazing. can't get enough of it. Without Love is already one of my favorite songs ever |
This.
John Samson is the farthest thing from so-so in terms of songwriters. | | |
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09:05 AM on 03/10/09 | Don't wait too long to come home I love the review, but i agree with everyone else about the Samson so-so talk. | | |
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09:23 AM on 03/10/09 | I love this band, but so far i'm a little dissapointed by this album, maybe it'll grow on me. | | |
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09:47 AM on 03/10/09 | This is the first album I've really listened to by these guys, and I love it. | | |
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09:50 AM on 03/10/09 | this is success-this is how we feel ha yeah my opinion that the Weakerthans are pretty meh is controversial I know, so that's why I've never reviewed them. | | |
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10:04 AM on 03/10/09 | I've been a fan for eight years now, and these guys are just as awesome and intense on this album as when I first got into them. Love it | | |
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10:31 AM on 03/10/09 | This album is the balls. 2009 is going to rule for melodicore. | | |
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10:43 AM on 03/10/09 | Feenay! Fee hee hee hee heenay! The Human(e) Meat intro bugs me out lol. Other than that it's a kick ass release! | | |
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11:03 AM on 03/10/09 | This album is the balls. 2009 is going to rule for melodicore. |
What genre's will people invent next?!? | | |
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12:08 PM on 03/10/09 | Love this album. Good job Eric. | | |
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