Reviews

The old adage about not judging books by their covers is true. Generally, the publisher picks the cover - not the author - so what’s on the front isn’t necessarily predictive of what’s inside. For example, Kurt Vonnegut’s not boring books all have the same boring covers.
 
But with albums, this rule doesn’t apply. I have argued many times that when it comes to album art, the artists do a pretty good job of picking representative covers – and Hoods did the best job of all, ever, throughout recorded history.
 
The front cover features cartoon drawings of a kid with straight edge Xs skanking, wearing a studded belt, a leather jacket-clad slam dancer, a shirtless stage diver, and the admittedly less common demonic bull in suspenders. Just add the moody, hair-dyed chick in a mini-skirt in the background and a pierced, red-eyed tough guy in the foreground and we’re done. It’s a masterpiece of hardcore art. Artcore.
 
Hoods’ album Ghetto Blaster is so overwrought with stereotypes and tough guy standards dragged out of the 80s New York hardcore scene that it’s cartoonish – hence the cartoons enacting aforementioned stereotypes on album art.
 
The songs are as packed full of stereotypes as the album cover. I counted. The entire lyrical content can be summarized as “people suck (I hate them) and I am really tough.” Also, “FUCK” (repeat two dozen times).
 
These lyrics are barfed/barked in a thrash metal-type yell over the same guitar chords and bass lines on a loop (repeat one dozen times).
 
Basically, this is the stuff I can’t stand in punk music, this get-out-of-my-face, angry-for-no-reason, gorilla-style-chest-beating, tough guy hardcore; at least when Agnostic Front did it, it was original. Hoods is just doing what a bunch of other bands did over twenty years ago. Ghetto Blaster is so over-the-top it might even be satire. In which case the album is really clever. But I don’t think that’s the intention.
 
Finally, kudos to bassist “Nape Rape” on a fantastic nickname. That’s so totally hilarious. He has rape in his name - he must be edgy and hardcore! Super hardcore. Cause rape is totally hardcore.