Reviews

What's there to tell about NOFX that hasn't been told before? Undoubtedly these guys were the most influential and popular melodic punkband in the early 90's, and although the releases after "Punk In Drublic" in 1994 didn't get to me as much as they did before, recently they managed to impress me again with their latest album "The War on Errorism". In between there was one other highlight with "The Decline", which in fact is the only release I'm missing in my collection and unfortunately is not on here either.
 
This comes with a 24 page booklet featuring pictures, flyers and short comments over the more than 20 years of their existance already. I have had the pleasure to experience their career evolution since about 1990 when they released "Ribbed" and it's quite funny to read the reviews of all these major punkzines in the booklet that show what controversy this band has evoked over the years. Often regarded as the treason in our punkscene, releasing albums that sounded overproduced and often reproached as being marketing-oriented, these guys have just been doing their thing because... I guess they just liked doing what they do, and that's to produce funny punkmusic that sticks. This "best of" album might again be looked at as a cheap way of cashing in, but I'm sure many younger kids will applaude the idea, and deservedly so, because this way you get a nice impression for only a few bucks of what this band was and is all about. And let's be honest, if there was ever a punkband that deserved to put one out it was these guys, with no less than 12 previous releases. There's no band in my collection that comes near this number. I'm amazed though that "The Malachi Crunch" wasn't on this one.
 
Anyway, the final track, which is a brand new song, is a bonus that I'll grab with both hands as it is a good 2 minute song that sounds like only NOFX can: the Fat Mike voice is there, the guitars churn and melodies and hooks flow. You won't find it better than with NOFX. Hope they'll do this for another 20. (guest review: Hein from punkupdates.com)