Customer Reviews

Barely Legal

5 star:		(11)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(6)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

When I first heard of The Hives and got glimpse of them my curiosity was peaked and I listened to Veni Vidi Vicious. I thought it was a great album and listen to it frequently. BUT, after listening to Barely Legal I was completely blown away! These guys are the real deal. If you thought true hardcore/punk was dead, rejoice! Apparently it is alive and well in Sweden. This album captures the power and energy that made bands like the Misfits, Minor Threat, and others so great. The songs are short, loud, frenetic, and compactly beautiful. Of course radio and TV will never play this music. Bands of the new punk (yeah right!) scene could only dream of playing like this. Hopefully commercial success will not soften the Hives. They may help revive the true punk/hardcore scene.

Before the perfectly crafted Veni Vidi Vicious, there was this. The sound is a lot the same, but the music is much more punk, much faster and harder, one great one- or two-minute song running into another, all at the same frenetic pace. The Ramones would be proud.

The Hives are one of the hottest bands around today, mingling Stooges-type punk with acid-penned songwriting. "Barely Legal" is a faster, punkier, nastier, harder album that came before their breakout album "Veni Vidi Vicious." It's immensely good, but it does suffer from an overabundance of soundalike songs.

It opens with a spoken intro to the band, which immediately leaps into a boiling rock song, which is only broken by Howlin Pelle occasionally saying "Well well well!", as if surprised by the band's sound. After that comes the spelling-bee rage of "A.K.A. I-D-I-O-T," roaring "Automatic Schmuck," and the well-named "Uptempo Venomous Poison,"

The Hives are not quite the saviors of rock'n'roll -- their music leans on classic punk a bit too much for that. But they might be one day. Where most rock is polished and passionless, the Hives are full of emotion and take-no-cr*p rants against the "mighty mighty man." I'll take that above "my girlfriend left me and I'm sad" rock-pop anyday.

The problem is that the raw, lo-fi instrumentation is a bit too alike from one song to the next -- for example, the drum intro to "Closed For the Season" appears a few songs ago, although in a shorter form. Each one is a boiling, roiling mass of guitar, bass and smashing drums -- incredibly catchy, full of righteous rage, but very similar to the songs around them.

Howlin' Pelle Almqvist lives up to his name here. He has pretty ordinary singing, but really shines when he lets rip with his raw vocals. And their songwriting drips with rebellion and anger. Heck, you don't even have to hear the songs -- just read the titles: "What's that Spell... Go To Hell!", "AKA I-D-I-O-T" and "I'm A Wicked One."

"Barely Legal" isn't quite as good as their breakout album -- it needs a bit more musical variety. But it is the sort of endearingly nasty punk-rock that this Swedish band has become famous for. Definitely recommended.

This one is my favorite by the Hives. It's got all the elements that make the Hives great, but this one is more raw than later albums; a bit more chaotic. This one is more in the fast punk vein, but still has that quirky Hives quality to it. This blew my mind the first time I heard it, and 10 years later, it still sounds fresh and vital.

Although "Barely Legal," the Hives' debut album, is often categorized as punk, it is much better suited to the genre of garage rock. When listening to it, it's easy to imagine these guys at home in their native Sweden, in the garage, annoying the whole neighborhood with their obnoxiously noisy sound.

Despite this, the Hives have created a great album, something difficult to do when playing as hard, as fast, and as loud as humanly possible. It kicks off with "Well, Well, Well," a one-minute romp in which you can picture vocalist Howlin' Pelle Almqvist stomping around and diving into a mosh-pit.

A few of following tracks are more subdued--at least by Hives standards--and allow the band to show off their talents as musicians. Guitarists Nicholaus Arson and Vigilante Carlstroem work quite well together, and their skills are especially evident on "A.K.A. I-D-I-O-T" and "Black Jack." The commanding punch packed by drummer Chris Dangerous is displayed on "Uptempo Venomous Poison" and "Closed For The Season." In addition, the songwriting (credited to the fictional Randy Fitzsimmons) shows the Hives' dissent and their penchant for hostility: "Automatic Schmuck" proclaims to the government: "I was born and plated, the schmuck they created... I'll explode, I'll erode, yeah I'll break your f---ing code, 'cause I'm an automatic schmuck with a tendency to rock".

There is some truth to the criticism that many of the songs sound the same on this record, but when the music rocks this much, who cares? All you'll care about once you put the CD on is banging your head.

i was a huge fan of the hives all because of main offender. so it was only a matter of time before i checked out barely legal. i've been very impressed. i thought this was a great cd. fast, loud, everything you'd expect from the hives. every song is great, but i like here we go again, automatic schmuck, hail hail spit and drool and a.k.a I-D-I-O-T.

This record blows a hole in the wall of RnR that has come out of the Scandinavian area of the world over the last few years by the likes of Hellacopters, Gluecifer, Turbonegro et al. Sounding like a melding of New Bomb Turks, Makers, and The Dickies I guess(?) because this is so spastic but so damn great at the same time. Songs bump, grind and groove and then launch into a headlong driving pace until they crash at their end. Cool funky wavey guitar lines and even organ thrown in as well keep this from sounding redundant and the worst part is that this record is over too soon.

The Hives are one of the few true bits of punk music getting attention, mingling Stooges-type punk with acid-penned songwriting. "Barely Legal" is a faster, punkier, nastier, harder album that came before their breakout album "Veni Vidi Vicious." It's immensely good, but it does suffer from an overabundance of soundalike songs.

It opens with a spoken intro to the band, which immediately leaps into a boiling rock song, which is only broken by Howlin Pelle occasionally saying "Well well well!", as if surprised by the band's sound. After that comes the spelling-bee rage of "A.K.A. I-D-I-O-T," roaring "Automatic Schmuck," and the well-named "Uptempo Venomous Poison,"

The Hives are not quite the saviors of rock'n'roll -- their music leans on classic punk a bit too much for that. But they might be one day. Where most rock is polished and passionless, the Hives are full of emotion and take-no-cr*p rants against the "mighty mighty man." I'll take that above "my girlfriend left me and I'm sad" rock-pop anyday.

The problem is that the raw, lo-fi instrumentation is a bit too alike from one song to the next -- for example, the drum intro to "Closed For the Season" appears a few songs ago, although in a shorter form. Each one is a boiling, roiling mass of guitar, bass and smashing drums -- incredibly catchy, full of righteous rage, but very similar to the songs around them.

Howlin' Pelle Almqvist lives up to his name here. He has pretty ordinary singing, but really shines when he lets rip with his raw vocals. And their songwriting drips with rebellion and anger. Heck, you don't even have to hear the songs -- just read the titles: "What's that Spell... Go To Hell!", "AKA I-D-I-O-T" and "I'm A Wicked One."

"Barely Legal" isn't quite as good as their breakout album -- it needs a bit more musical variety. But it is the sort of endearingly nasty punk-rock that this Swedish band has become famous for. Definitely recommended.

The Hives are one of the hottest bands around today, mingling Stooges-type punk with acid-penned songwriting. "Barely Legal" is a faster, punkier, nastier, harder album that came before their breakout album "Veni Vidi Vicious." It's immensely good, but it does suffer from an overabundance of soundalike songs.

It opens with a spoken intro to the band, which immediately leaps into a boiling rock song, which is only broken by Howlin Pelle occasionally saying "Well well well!", as if surprised by the band's sound. After that comes the spelling-bee rage of "A.K.A. I-D-I-O-T," roaring "Automatic Schmuck," and the well-named "Uptempo Venomous Poison,"

The Hives are not quite the saviors of rock'n'roll -- their music leans on classic punk a bit too much for that. But they might be one day. Where most rock is polished and passionless, the Hives are full of emotion and take-no-cr*p rants against the "mighty mighty man." I'll take that above "my girlfriend left me and I'm sad" rock-pop anyday.

The problem is that the raw, lo-fi instrumentation is a bit too alike from one song to the next -- for example, the drum intro to "Closed For the Season" appears a few songs ago, although in a shorter form. Each one is a boiling, roiling mass of guitar, bass and smashing drums -- incredibly catchy, full of righteous rage, but very similar to the songs around them.

Howlin' Pelle Almqvist lives up to his name here. He has pretty ordinary singing, but really shines when he lets rip with his raw vocals. And their songwriting drips with rebellion and anger. Heck, you don't even have to hear the songs -- just read the titles: "What's that Spell... Go To Hell!", "AKA I-D-I-O-T" and "I'm A Wicked One."

"Barely Legal" isn't quite as good as their breakout album -- it needs a bit more musical variety. But it is the sort of endearingly nasty punk-rock that this Swedish band has become famous for. Definitely recommended.

This CD is fast, chaotic, loud and distorted as possible... in other words, what punk rock is all about. Gritty and straight from the garage, the Hives' debut full length is a flurry of short, noisy songs that treads the line between 80s hardcore and 70s nostalgia.

Songs like AKA IDIOT and Here We Go Again are mini masterpieces in their own right, perfect bursts of frantic energy delivered in a spastic manner by frontman Howlin' Pelle Almqvist. My only complaint is the often shoddy production.

Anybody who heard Hate to Say I Told You So on MTV and wants to investigate further, pick up Barely Legal.