CD Review – Filter
The Trouble with Angels
Rocket Science Ventures
Filter has been around for over 15 years, yet this is only their fifth album and it sounds like a conglomoration of their past four records. Starting off with the lead single “The Inevitable Relapse,” lead singer and Filter kingpin Richard Patrick essentially remakes the band’s first smash hit “Hey Man, Nice Shot” with a quiet verse and then a screaming chorus, this time about how you can “drink it, snort it, smoke it/ Every little thing I love about it.” The next track, “Drug Boy” is very much the same with crushing guitars and Patrick’s vocals grinding once again about going downtown for a “drug run.”
He gets more into the Title of Record-era with tracks “Absentee Father” and “No Love.” He gets a little more radio-friendly as the disc moves along with songs like the title track and “No Re-Entry,” a “Take a Picture” type of song where he laments “They’ll put the pages back in your bruised book/ They’ll put the pages back with rusty hooks/ Once you leave, there’s no re-entry.”
Patrick eventually ends up with a more electronically-based industrial rock sound that is not as intense as the beginning of the album, or the beginning of his career. Has Filter gone soft? Absolutely not. They’ve just evolved. And with their latest, they essentially chronicle how their sound has arrived at this point. Filter fans should definitely hop on for the ride. If you are not a fan, then this probably won’t convert you; to those people, I feel sorry for you.
