Most Helpful Customer Reviews
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16 of 16 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
signal to noise..., June 2, 2004
BR have done very little wrong and damn near everything right, especially in the late 80's when they were at the height of their powers. No Control is an interesting release- it shows the band switching up styles a bit... it was put out between their best straight forward no frills punk album: Suffer (1988)- one of the best of its kind- and their explosive, experimental, incendiary, thematically-rich, dictionary-bursting masterpiece: Against the Grain (1990)- one of the best albums period. Of any genre or group. If you disagree fine, you're certainly entitled to be moron. On No Control you can sense the growing pains. Personally, I don't think it holds a candle to the album it followed OR the album it preceded... Still, on this one you can hear the band become supreme punk badasses, veering into alien territory. Greg and Brett are starting to adopt their own unique lyrical tacts, and the band is exploring different rhythms and shifts in sonic texture. It's far better produced than any of their preceding albums. Lyrically it's closer to Suffer, musically it edges into the blazing speed attack that burned so bright on against the grain and dimmed on subsequent releases (Generator, Stranger than Fiction, Recipe for hate...) While I dig Suffer's brazen rawness more than this and Against the Grains tightly constrained yet explosive fury more than this- without No Control everything that came later might not have come to pass. So I am thankful for it. had it not been for Bad religion, all of the crappy bands I played in would have been even crappier... If you can imagine... Pick it up. It's better than anything you'll hear on your local alternative rock (whatever that means these days) station.
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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Reckless, fast...and yet somehow melodic and introspective, August 25, 2004
Yep, that about sums up BR's entire sound. As fast and angry as any good punk offering should be and yet at the same incredibly melodic and meaningful, with lyrics like no other band out there. No Control was put out in 1989 as the middle child of quite possibly one of the greatest three-album anthologies in music's history (among the likes of tri-album glory as Public Enemy and Led Zeppelin). The album feels exactly the way it suggests: like that there is absolutely no control. Just when you think the blazing guitars, pounding drums, and machine-gun lyrics (yeah, that's a stupid adjective I know) could not possibly come together to form anything even close to resembling music, it shocks you by forming something entirely better than 90% of music out there. Unlike many BR fans, I don't see this album as the weaker of the amazing trifecta (Suffer in '88 and Against the Grain in '90). I think this as just as good if not better than those albums (well I take it back...Suffer is still in my mind the best punk album of all time). Nevertheless, this album is one of the enjoyable and truly-punk masterpieces of all time and belongs in any music fans collection, let alone punk music fan. It also proves once again that BR is clearly one of the most unique, thought-provoking, and musically talented bands of all time. Period.
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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Maybe they could see into the future..., March 28, 2004
First of all, this is a great album and my personal favorite by BR. They have a great ORIGINAL sound. I'd like to address teh accusation of Bad Religion trying to sound like Sum 41. As I'm sure all of you BR fans know, this album was released in the late 80s. According to a previous post "Television" (which is from the album "Stranger Than Fiction"), is "a complete rip-off of Sum 41". For those of you who do not know, "Stranger Than Fiction" was released in '94, while Sum 41 was formed in '96. Just thought I'd point that out. Also, if you like this album, try "Generator" and "Process of Belief".
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