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At The Drive-in | Relationship Of Command

Too much Red Bull makes good music.
CD, Grand Royal

Tekst: Bas Ickenroth

Publicatiedatum: 15 november 2000

I wasn't prepared for it. Having read a lot about At The Drive-In and wanting to know if the hype was true, I went on downloading a song from their album 'Relationship of command'. It turned out be song no. 4 on that album, called 'Sleepwalk capsules'. I've expected a guitarcore band, nothing special. But I wasn't prepared for the extreme outburst of energy within the first few seconds of the song. Fuck man, it made me jump through my room until I reached the ceiling, and I couldn't stop myself. The energy and agression emerging from 'Sleepwalk capsules' was so unexpected, I hadn't heard it since, well, since 'Do it' from Henry Rollins, and we all know that is a long time ago. It also was long ago I was so excited about getting a rockalbum as soon as possible. So, I hoped that the whole album would be as good as the above mentioned song, but to make a long story somewhat shorter: 'Relationship of command' is not entirely consistent 'til the end. Let's not make it worse than it is in reality - one of the best rockalbums of the year - but the high level of 'Sleepwalk capsules' isn't maintained for the whole album. What can you expect from At The Drive-In? Imagine something between Fugazi, Tool, Dead Kennedys and Sonic Youth, and then you're somewhere in vicinity of their sound. Add to this an explosive singer which sounds like the frustrated bastard-son of Jello Biafra, Maynard James Keenan and Zack de la Rocha, and voila: you'll have At The Drive-In. Of course 'Sleepwalk capsules' isn't the only magnificent song on the album. 'Patterns against user' and 'Cosmonaut' are just as good, and the fierce punkrock attack of 'Mannequin republic' is already legendary. One aspect that is really convincing is the constant use good melodies, no matter how agressive a song is. The ability of the singer to switch between nervous, agressive, feeling-the-spit-in-your-face attacks and evenly nervous melodic outbursts is also a big factor in the At The Drive-In sound. Unfortunately songs like 'Invalid litter dept.' and 'Rolodex propaganda' are not as good as the rest. The first has some outdated sounding spokenword parts, but grows in the last minute onto the high level of the rest of the album, while the latter simply doesn't have really good melodies in the verses and bridge. But those two are the only little downsides to this magnificent album, which by the way has a very good production by Ross Robinson and superb mix by Andy Wallace. Next to Deftones the best rockalbum of the year.

http://www.kindamuzik.net/recensie/at-the-drive-in/relationship-of-command/195/
Meer At The Drive-in op KindaMuzik: http://www.kindamuzik.net/artiest/at-the-drive-in