Review by Tom Hersey
Few know Flipper outside of that shirt Kurt Cobain was famously photographed wearing. However, the influence the San Francisco sludge punk act exerted on alternative music is undeniably recognisable. The precursor to bands like latter-day Black Flag and the Melvins, in the ‘70s and ‘80s Flipper helped create the fabric of modern day alt-rock. Their first studio album since 1993’s American Grafishy, Love sees Flipper capture all the irony, anger and urgency of their first two seminal albums. Accompanied by Fight, a disc recorded live by Jack Endino featuring some of the band’s classic material, Love is another Flipper masterpiece. Intentional or otherwise, the album has an endearing undercurrent of dark, ironic humour. The band has been playing for 30-plus years, yet hark the opening line to Be Good, Child! – “Growing up is hard, in this tough, old world”. Lyrically, Love is a refreshing return to the glory days of the Dead Kennedys and The Minutemen. The riffs on Why Can’t You See Me and Old Graves are uncomfortably slow and depressive, ex-Nirvana bassist Krist Novoselic’s low end offering a superb accompaniment to Ted Falconi’s guitar. Like the patented sludge sound Flipper fashioned for themselves back in the day, Love is bleak, impersonal and physically draining to listen to. In spite of the aural nuisance Flipper create, or perhaps because of it, Love is a piece of art that will resonate strongly with Flipper fans of old and fans of alt-rock discovering something new that feels genuine.
Review by Matt Schild
It’s either a testament to the biodiversity in the punk ecosystem or a measure of how badly punk’s spun out of control when a mere four days after Green Day drops its latest eyeliner-encrusted rock opera on the world that Flipper releases a new studio album. There’s a line scrawled in the sand. Pick your side: Appearances on Good Morning America or in smelly rock clubs. Anthems made to blare from radios or anthems made to peel paint off the walls. Rebellion as a catch phrase held over from the Bush II era or rebellion as a catch phrase held over from the Reagan era.
Flipper might not be the freshest punk act on the planet (really, though neither is Green Day), but the San Francisco noise freaks haven’t lost much of their early cachet. Sure, there’s nothing to rival the band’s 1982 noise-punk masterwork, “Sex Bomb” anywhere near Love, but Flipper’s still nearly as overworked, over-amplified and over-exaggerated as it was when the band was young.
With former Nirvana bassist Krist Novoselic holding down the low end, Flipper swims through a dirty sea of grimy noise. Novoselic’s bass lords over the mix, with Ted Falconi’s guitar’s low ends bleed into it as the foursome riles up listeners. You’ll either immediately fall in love with Love or you’ll be alienated and hate it forever. That’s just how all punk rock used to be, remember?
Garage noise and hardcore abandon make Love a testament to old-school punk confrontation. “Be Good, Child” comes out of the gate, with a bass line that rumbles and pummels with equal measure as frontman Bruce Loose barks with the insistence of a smoker with a pack-a-day habit asking — more like demanding — to bum a smoke. Falconi’s guitar attacks Novoselic’s concrete-crumbling bass line like an angle-grinder on “Triple Mass.” “Why Can’t You See” jumps head-first into that empty swimming pool of full-on noise-punk, breaking every bone in its body in a wild-eyed jaunt through punk’s seamiest moments.
If mainstream punk faces a destiny where repeated spit-polishing rubs it clean away, the murky underground world will be there with our helping of noise, grime and sleaze. Love is punk rock at its worst, which, really is when it’s at its best.
Love
Fight (Live)