The Bennies - Better Off Dread (22/12/2013)
I learned the other day that apparently The Bennies are one of the best bands in my local Melbourne for live performances. I really hope thats the case because honestly they’d need to be better than The Flaming Lips in order to get me to enjoy their latest release.
Better Off Dread is an incredibly annoying collection of songs, and look, I get it, I understand punk and ska have a whole community around them, and that what might be considered good for them may not line up with what I consider to be worthwhile punk music, but when the songs you write are so vacuous and irritating that they can’t even get by on just being vacuous and irritating as some sort of entertainment value, there’s something seriously wrong.
Who thought lyrics like “I’m gonna ride my bike, wherever I fucking like” were a good idea? Especially when the music they’re sung over is so devoid of personality that there is literally nowhere to turn on their EP of four songs for even a drop of original content or an idea where you don’t say to yourself “oh (whatever ska/punk band) did this with more (personality/punch/originality/fun) than The Bennies could ever hope to”.
Let me put it this way, I don’t often find myself having conversations with inanimate objects, but I literally told my car stereo to shut up after I let myself play this record to many times, and if what The Bennies’ say is true, that “ska is dead”, well, it’s music like this that’s keeping it that way.
Nick Kennedy
Better Off Dread is an incredibly annoying collection of songs, and look, I get it, I understand punk and ska have a whole community around them, and that what might be considered good for them may not line up with what I consider to be worthwhile punk music, but when the songs you write are so vacuous and irritating that they can’t even get by on just being vacuous and irritating as some sort of entertainment value, there’s something seriously wrong.
Who thought lyrics like “I’m gonna ride my bike, wherever I fucking like” were a good idea? Especially when the music they’re sung over is so devoid of personality that there is literally nowhere to turn on their EP of four songs for even a drop of original content or an idea where you don’t say to yourself “oh (whatever ska/punk band) did this with more (personality/punch/originality/fun) than The Bennies could ever hope to”.
Let me put it this way, I don’t often find myself having conversations with inanimate objects, but I literally told my car stereo to shut up after I let myself play this record to many times, and if what The Bennies’ say is true, that “ska is dead”, well, it’s music like this that’s keeping it that way.
Nick Kennedy