Album Review – Rebel Inc. – S/T
We usually don’t review out of town albums here at Motor City Rocks, Rebel Inc. are from Michigan, now Maryland, so that’s close enough, right?
Rebel inc. will be playing the Eagle Theater in Pontiac on Friday June 4th.
Rebel Inc. is highly influenced by rage against the machine. So much so that it’s mentioned over and over again in their promotional material. Rebel inc. isn’t ever going to be Rage Against The Machine. Rage Against The Machine came out of left field in 1992 with their blend of metal, oscilating guitar distortion and hip hop. Parts of me want to say it’s ok for Rebel inc. to want to be RATM since RATM is no longer RATM. Kind of like how the Beatles have 100 tribute bands.
Now that we’re post George W. Bush, the album seems a little out of place. Maybe late by as much as 6 years. You can kick the neo-cons while they’re down, but Obama has hardly been an anti-capitalist. He’s put in place mandatory purchase of for-profit health insurance, done next to nothing for the environment, and escalated the war in Afghanistan. Where are the songs declaring “The Democratic Party is the main enemy of revolutionary labor, workers, and students!” Where are the teeth that are so important to political fueled heavy rock? The Dead Kennedy’s would ask “Why don’t they kill kill kill kill kill the poor?” over the shrinking of the welfare state. We’re in the most tumultuous historical period of all time. EVERYTHING is melting down, world economies, the Middle East, the environment. What’s Rebel Inc.’s suggestion or comment on the situation. Where are they going to take us.
Nowhere and nothing. I’ve studied the lyrics, website, and myspace of Rebel Inc. From all this I’ve gathered that Rebel Inc. is pro freedom, rights, violence, bleeding, and revolution in the most basic and vague sense of the terms. So essentially they’re Tea Partiers? I can’t tell you one way or the other. For a band that claims to be so heavily indebted to Rage Against The Machine, it might be time they picked up one of the books in the Evil Empire linear notes. There’s a full list of the books here (in case you’re curious).
“Everything that you hate” – Rebel Inc.
Maybe I’m an old man, and I shouldn’t be too rough on Rebel for posturing as revolutionaries, no, no I’m not. They’re press kit includes this line: “These guys have a hypnotic effect on me reminiscent of Hitler’s spell on the Germans” OK, so you’re not history professors. BEING COMPARED TO HITLER IS NOT A GOOD THING AT ALL. They have a lyric “How can majority rule, a free land?“, yet early in the album the encourage the listener to march uniformly in “March”. The cover art tells you off the bat you’re going into one of the most clichéd rock experiences possible.
Still with all of these problems the album still has some catchy riffs, the band is all together, the music is alright though nothing you haven’t heard before. Imagine a Rage Against The Machine VHS tape. now imagine it copied. Then the copy is copied. Then that copy is copied. The fourth generation tape, for all of it’s quality loss is Rebel, Inc.
Related posts:
Trackback from your site.