Weird, but it works. A lot of their later stuff is weird and doesn’t work, so small victories, right? Powerman 5000 isn’t a band so much as singer/frontman Spider One (who is Rob Zombie’s brother) writing music with whoever happens to walk through the studio door. The band has an ex-member list as long as a monkey’s arm, and frequently changes styles. Across the years, they’ve been an indie hip-hop outfit, a rap-rock band, a crazy glittery Babylon Zoo-esque performance act, a pop punk group, and then a weird amalgamation of all those things.
This is the rap-rock incarnation of Powerman 5000. Noisy, edgy Limp Bizkit sounding stuff sold by a vocalist who drawls as much as he raps and has an obsession with comics, B movies, and martial arts films. The guitar work is visceral and sloppy, heavy on the effects, and there are even some solos (which were hard to come by in the mid 90s).
The CD functions more like a sonic house of horrors than a set of cohesive songs. “Neckbone” and “Organizized” are pretty fun, with Spider just yawping all over the place and letting out throat-ripping screams. “Standing 8” has vague implications of radio-friendliness, sounding like a Red Hot Chili Peppers song at times. Production is pretty raw. It’s listenable. I could do without the overly roomy snare.
Do I like this? Maybe the only way I can answer is to say that I don’t hate it enough to turn it off. There are listenable moments, and the whole thing is just too much of an experience to easily forget. Skip the bullshit joke song at the end.
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