Somehow, last week, Hollywood Undead’s third album, “Notes From The Underground,” stormed the Billboard album charts and managed to briefly become the second most popular album in the U.S.
Seriously, America? You let this happen? I might have accepted this back in the mid-2000s when the whole emo-rap thing was still in its prime and this sort of thing somehow passed as acceptable, but at the very least I thought we had moved on to otherterrible music trends. But no, apparently what we wanted last week was a teenage angst-ridden dose of white boy rap backed up by some distorted guitar riffs. Obviously the fact that this anachronism managed to get to the No. 2 position in the album charts means it was totally awesome, right?
Well, as the first song began, I knew the situation was dire. Between the lyrics, which reeked of a 12-year-old trying to write something “edgy,” and the whiny emo vocals in the chorus and intro, I was well aware of exactly what I had gotten myself into. What would I do if you told me you hate me, Hollywood Undead? Presumably, I’d be really happy and then respond by telling you to write some better tracks. By the way, the “Does this smell like chloroform?” joke got old like three years ago, guys.
The next few songs devolve into their usual confused messy mixture of rap, emo, metal and pop. The problem isn’t that they’re mixing genres, however. It’s that each element of that mixture is of a supremely bad quality. They’re bad rappers (Charlie Scene couldn’t change his flow to save his life), they have some of the most boring riffs I’ve heard in ages on their heavy tracks, they subscribe to every emo cliché imaginable and their pop comes off as third-rate and thrown in.
It’s after this point that some of the more uniquely awful songs spring up. “Pig Skin” is the band’s attempt at simultaneously mocking club songs while cashing in on the genre, either way about two years too late for it to be relevant. Also, someone seriously needs to tell Charlie Scene that the way he constantly references different brands of booze in every single song doesn’t so much make him sound cool as it does make it sound like he has a drinking problem. This one really is laughably bad, though, so I recommend listening to it if only for the sheer spectacle of witnessing a musical car crash.
Following this, we have “Kill Everyone” which is a terribly rapped, sung and played song that sounds uncomfortably like it’s supposed to be a school shooter anthem, featuring the lyric “Now let’s let the f***in’ gun break the silence/Close your eyelids/Another shot and then here come the sirens/I thought I told you to keep f***in’ quiet? /Somebody’s dyin’, so come say goodbye, kids.”
“From The Underground,” meanwhile, legitimately sounds like it could be a One Direction track for the most part. Any pretension of edginess or grit is immediately lost as Danny wails and croons with his badly autotuned voice over keys and synthesized strings.
The one vaguely enjoyable song on the album is the brainless party track “Up in Smoke,” which encourages the listener to “Get down like you just got out of rehab” and actually makes for a decent party track. However, a friend pointed out to me that the beat and some of the vocal melodies seem to blatantly rip off the song “Night Shift” by edIT (a much better song) so even this one is tainted.
Overall, the most striking thing about this album is how the band has found new and unique ways to suck even more. Whoever thought throwing pop elements into their god-awful Linkin Park style emo-rap was sorely mistaken, and I think it’s been proven once and for all that Hollywood Undead needs a stake through the heart.
One Out of Five Stars
Seriously, America? You let this happen? I might have accepted this back in the mid-2000s when the whole emo-rap thing was still in its prime and this sort of thing somehow passed as acceptable, but at the very least I thought we had moved on to otherterrible music trends. But no, apparently what we wanted last week was a teenage angst-ridden dose of white boy rap backed up by some distorted guitar riffs. Obviously the fact that this anachronism managed to get to the No. 2 position in the album charts means it was totally awesome, right?
Well, as the first song began, I knew the situation was dire. Between the lyrics, which reeked of a 12-year-old trying to write something “edgy,” and the whiny emo vocals in the chorus and intro, I was well aware of exactly what I had gotten myself into. What would I do if you told me you hate me, Hollywood Undead? Presumably, I’d be really happy and then respond by telling you to write some better tracks. By the way, the “Does this smell like chloroform?” joke got old like three years ago, guys.
The next few songs devolve into their usual confused messy mixture of rap, emo, metal and pop. The problem isn’t that they’re mixing genres, however. It’s that each element of that mixture is of a supremely bad quality. They’re bad rappers (Charlie Scene couldn’t change his flow to save his life), they have some of the most boring riffs I’ve heard in ages on their heavy tracks, they subscribe to every emo cliché imaginable and their pop comes off as third-rate and thrown in.
It’s after this point that some of the more uniquely awful songs spring up. “Pig Skin” is the band’s attempt at simultaneously mocking club songs while cashing in on the genre, either way about two years too late for it to be relevant. Also, someone seriously needs to tell Charlie Scene that the way he constantly references different brands of booze in every single song doesn’t so much make him sound cool as it does make it sound like he has a drinking problem. This one really is laughably bad, though, so I recommend listening to it if only for the sheer spectacle of witnessing a musical car crash.
Following this, we have “Kill Everyone” which is a terribly rapped, sung and played song that sounds uncomfortably like it’s supposed to be a school shooter anthem, featuring the lyric “Now let’s let the f***in’ gun break the silence/Close your eyelids/Another shot and then here come the sirens/I thought I told you to keep f***in’ quiet? /Somebody’s dyin’, so come say goodbye, kids.”
“From The Underground,” meanwhile, legitimately sounds like it could be a One Direction track for the most part. Any pretension of edginess or grit is immediately lost as Danny wails and croons with his badly autotuned voice over keys and synthesized strings.
The one vaguely enjoyable song on the album is the brainless party track “Up in Smoke,” which encourages the listener to “Get down like you just got out of rehab” and actually makes for a decent party track. However, a friend pointed out to me that the beat and some of the vocal melodies seem to blatantly rip off the song “Night Shift” by edIT (a much better song) so even this one is tainted.
Overall, the most striking thing about this album is how the band has found new and unique ways to suck even more. Whoever thought throwing pop elements into their god-awful Linkin Park style emo-rap was sorely mistaken, and I think it’s been proven once and for all that Hollywood Undead needs a stake through the heart.
One Out of Five Stars
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