For some time now, I’ve privately lamented that rock music has grown so estranged from its rebellious roots; it’s become hard to associate the form with its progenitors. Occasionally, a truly progressive band comes along that puts the “roll” back into the rock, oozing a raw sexuality while maintaining politically based lyrics that display the turmoil and angst that rock’s fan base often swirl around in. The St. Louis-based Living Things is one such band. They breathe new life into music that has been systemically sanitized, corporative, and rendered not so gratefully dead.
It’s the kind of band Lou Reed would love- stripped down to its essentials of guitar, bass, and drums supporting brooding vocals with ironic and just plain, low-down truthful lyrics. It’s the product of the brothers Berlin: Lillian, Eve, and Bosh, with some backup from friend Cory Becker. Throughout the album, the Berlins and Becker pay tribute to many of their mentors.
The first two songs, “Bombs Below” and “I Owe” are extremely reminiscent of early Ramones works. From there we get to the hit “Bom, Bom, Bom” and “New Year”, which eerily recalls the spirit of 70’s glam provocateurs Marc Bolan and T. Rex.
Musically, the rest of the album sways gently between some early Brit-punk and Seattle-based grunge. But the music, as good as it is, serves a supporting role to Lillian Berlin’s writing. Highly esteemed colleagues often compare this band to Nirvana. But if Nirvana spoke to the angst and rage of Generation X, Living Things speaks for a new generation of the young, who’ve had their rage calmed by legal pushers of Prozac and Ritalin. They’ve received medically induced teenage lobotomies, without having to undergo the tortuous invasions of the adult world’s scalpels. And Lillian would know, having been put on a regimen of those same medications during his teen years. In a country where normal growing pains are sometimes turned into designer illnesses, it’s not surprising that Lillian refers to these kids as the “blackout generation”.
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