Real Kevin – Freak Out
Most rock musicians, especially those belonging to the 1990s groups were not ordinary people and did not possess many ordinary hobbies. This, naturally, fed into the way that they made music, as well as the roads some of them went on. Horror movies, bizarre fetishes, a penchant for unorthodox methods of having fun, could be checked off the list of most grunge icons, for example.
It is, naturally, more charming to think of these artists as people who were chosen by these hobbies and not the other way around. This is not entirely true. For example, Kurt Cobain took up a passion for visual art, particularly pieces involving ripped doll parts, as a way to justify his lifestyle. People look differently on folks with these kinds of past-times. In the music community, they look at them with respect.
Real Kevin’s Freak Out sounds like the sort of music & video made by someone that has been fed a large diet of movies, books, and visual art connected to the alternative rock space. The grungey tone of the guitar and vocals flow well with the sharp, somewhat disturbing imagery presented in the music video. Meanwhile, the vocal melodies echo the turbulent 1960s pop-rock style. Freak Out is a great mixture of much of what is odd and great about rock.
CooCoo – God(B)less America
The Dutch may have been disliking and distrusting the U.S. and capitalism for a while yet, but back in Eastern Europe the American Dream was and continues to be, really, one of the few things that kept people going. It’s much the same way that a church goer might arrange their whole life around the hope of one day sitting beside their Lord.
Fretting about the evils of capitalism is a powerful, well-needed concept, but also a luxury. We can criticize the United States of America because they allow us to complain. Start trying to preach to the myriad of countries where human rights are routinely violated on a daily basis and see how far you get?
With that being said, we need protest songs. Frankly, we’ll always need them regardless of how well, or poorly things may be going on in the world. CooCoo’s God(B)less America is as natural as a brick to the mayor’s office, a protest in front of the court house, or a hipster buying a year’s long avocado supply. It must come to pass and punk rock needs to detail the events.
