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9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Even the toughest punks cry sometimes, August 1, 2006
I remember when this album came out. Hard fast loud aggro-core was in it's glory days in the underground all across America and TSOL were one of the main focal point bands of that scene, along with Black Flag, Circle Jerks, Minor Threat, Bad Brains etc. So imagine what most of the hardcore kids' reaction was to this album when it hit their ears for the first time. TSOL caught a LOT of... ahem... "do-doo" for it! I saw them on the tour they did for this album and most of the kids at the show were unreceptive to put it mildly! I remember one guy I hung out with back then who upon hearing the first 2 songs after buying this, yanked the record off his turntable and smashed it to little black shards over his speakers.
My personal take on it? Well, this album came out right about the same time I saw my first Damned show. That was a very pivotal time for me musically. Up until then I had been a typical early 80's short-haired hardcore hound... if it didn't move at the speed of light with amps cranked to 11 I didn't want to have anything to do with it. Seeing the Damned changed all that for me. They just blew me away when I saw them, and they were playing longer, more pop-oriented songs with a keyboard player in tow (from their then-new album "Strawberries"), but with incredible punk energy and attitude, and it cracked my mind wide open to new ideas and new tastes. Then I bought "Beneath The Shadows" a few days later and the timing couldn't have been better. The moody psychedelic overtones grabbed me just the right way, and the more I listened, the more I got into it. Most of my friends didn't though, and I got a lot of s*%t for openly liking it. Whatever. Later on many of those same people came to appreciate this album. The sad thing is that this album didn't get that kind of appreciation until after Jack and Todd left the band in disgust with all the negative attention they were getting at the time, and TSOL became an entirely different band altogether. Most bands that have had the balls and imagination to break new ground have suffered the same fate. Those are usually the bands I like best. To me that's all punk was really about anyway... doing your own thing no matter what the current popular trend is, and breaking away from the herd.
So anyway, this severely underrated album still gets a lot of play on my various sources of musical listening devices. It has aged well, like the rest of TSOL's early output, and is a profound testament to the pioneering punk spirit that says SCREW RULES AND GUIDELINES. In my opinion it was the last great TSOL album and if you don't limit your tastes to the rigid dogmatic guidelines of what necessitates a "genre", then you'll love this album... or at least appreciate it.
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7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Get this album NOW, May 18, 2003
TSOL were so brave when they released this album way back then. Being an LA punk band and releasing this very experimental album was very ballsy indeed. Raved by critics but frowned upon by many of their peers at the time, This album stands the TEST of time. Forever old, Wash away, soft focus, and the beautiful title track make this album TIMELESS. It sounded like it couldve been released yesterday. This is why TSOL will always be my favortie band among other LA acts of the same period.
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8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
It has been FAR TOO LONG....Thank you, Nitro Records!, June 30, 2001
My god, does Dexter Holland deserve some brown-nosing or what? Without mentioning the fact that he plays in The Offspring (a group I don't care much for), he deserves kudos for having the guts to re-release this wonderful record upon an unsuspecting audience once more.What can you call this? Punk? It's far too intricate and developed to merely fit in that genre. Pop music? This music has the hard edge that cancels that out. Rock n' Roll? Close, more like GREAT Rock n' Roll. On Beneath The Shadows, TSOL offer up an appetizing combination of anger, sadness, pain, and hope that is scattered across the whole record. Never before has Jack Grisham shown that his delivery could be THIS good...I love the band, but his voice is just on a different level from previous releases. Todd (RIP) Barnes' drumming is precise and hard without descending into overkill. TSOL has always had one of the most powerful rhythm sections in punk, and the timeless Barnes/Roche team doesn't falter at any point. However, the record is made truly beautiful by Jack's voice and the incredible poetic force of Ron Emory's guitars and Greg Kuehn's keyboards. On an album where every track is great, it's hard to pick out standout tracks. I'd have to go with "She'll Be Saying," "Glass Streets," "Wash Away" (one of the most beautiful rock songs ever recorded...I swear, Ron's guitar sounds very nearly human on the solo), "Send My Thoughts," or the wonderful title track. To sum it all up, I'd recommend this to any self-respecting rock/punk fan who appreciates some thought and emotion in their music.
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