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Flotsam & Jetsam: No place for disgrace (2014)
31/01/14 || Habakuk
A new Flotsam & Jetsam album! No, not really. Yes, Flotsam, the band whose biggest achievement was losing a member to Metallica and who haven’t done anything too interesting since they released this album for the first time. You read right, they have now heeded their fanbase’s UNENDING calls for FINALLY re-recording their classic No place for disgrace – an album that never left much to be desired, but whatever. It didn’t exactly cement Flotsam’s status as a legendary outfit either, even if you could probably find that tag on their label’s promo shit somewhere. I didn’t read it. So yeah, if you can’t come up with anything noteworthy anymore, why not just repeat yourself without any specific need? I mean, Destruction have done it?
The reasoning behind re-recording an old album from your own back catalogue is still not quite clear to me. Especially if there is nothing wrong with it in the first place. It’s like navigating through a minefield on purpose, every little step you stray from the beaten path can be pretty catastrophic – and arguably, “No place for disgrace” was quite a strong album to begin with, so why not just leave it alone?
Especially since the band have changed absolutely nothing of relevance. Okay, they fucked up the cover art, whatever. In terms of line-up, only the bass player has changed since 1988 (big deal, yes), and in terms of songs, well, everything is left the way it was. Sure, the production is a bit different, with a somewhat modern sound as a result. It’s actually pretty okay, and that is taking into account that I detest modern production jobs. Still, I’m not sure if it was necessary to get more bass in, this was and is a thrash album after all, and the constant plus in low-end doesn’t really do much good.
Song-wise, they did good in almost not touching anything, apart from the opening riff to “Saturday night’s alright for fighting”, with horrendous results. Did I mention the minefield yet? All the other riffs are left alone and remain bad-ass as they were before, the songs are energetic and catchy (if a bit long), and so forth. Even the vocals are pretty similar, taking in account the 26 years since the last recording. Honestly, even writing this feels kind of pointless – it’s all been done before! And yes, it’s still an enjoyable listen, who’d have thought.
There truly was no place for disgrace here – but lo and behold, the same bunch of guys who wrote these songs can still play them. If you deem that worth your hard-earned money, feel free to support them on their retrospective trip. Never before has the following score been more fitting, though. The music would definitely warrant more points, but the overall lameness of the whole re-recording concept makes it only too fair.
- Information
- Released: 2014
- Label: Metal Blade Records
- Website: www.flotsam-and-jetsam.com/
- Band
- Eric A.K.: vocals
- Edward Carlson: guitars
- Michael Gilbert: guitars
- Jason Ward: bass
- Kelly David-Smith: drums
- Tracklist
- 1. No place for disgrace
- 2. Dreams of death
- 3. N.E. Terror
- 4. Escape from within
- 5. Saturday night’s alright for fighting
- 6. Hard on you
- 7. I live you die
- 8. Misguided fortune
- 9. P.A.A.B.
- 10. The Jones
