Tear It Up - December 2000 Session
2002 Coalition Records

Track Listing:
1.  Revolution
2.  Playing Dead
3.  Dance Dance Revolution
4.  Time Has Run Out
5.  Crash and Die
6.  N.F.P.
7.  Henrietta Stark
8.  Take My Life
9.  Thrash Wagon
10. We Real Cool
11. Bad Days
12. Count Backwards From 10
13. Friday Night
14. Tear It Up, Tear It Down
15. Death Wish
16. That's It?
17. I'll Make You Regret It
18. Girl Problems
19. EZ Pass = EZ Control

Line-Up:
Vocals:  Dave
Guitars:  Andy, Nick
Bass:  Doug
Drums:  Paul

Lamp's Rating:  A
Overall Rating:  A

Lamp's Review:
At this point, I've heard pretty much everything this band released in their short career as a band, but this is the release that stands out to me the most out of all of them.  Why?  A matter of variety.  The songs range from about 10 seconds long to two minutes.  They're not all fast, but none of them are really slow either.  Instead of all (or most) of the songs being about depression and loneliness and failure, there are some shockingly positive songs thrown in the mix.  When you can go from a song about making sweeping change in society for a better tomorrow directly into a song about how life sucks and all you want to do is die, it makes you wonder what's going on in the mind of Dave when he's writing lyrics and is much more gripping than one constant mood.

The instrument tones (particularly the snare drum) sound better to me than any other recording I've heard from this band.  The vocals are fierce all around, the backups just as powerful as ever, and the main vocals, while sounding sort of monotone, show obvious signs of fury.  This is another one of those CDs where the number of tracks is about the same as the length of the album in minutes, too, so while it's not so short as to make you feel ripped off, you can go through a quick listen and get just as much satisfaction as with something three times the length.  The music is pretty solid hardcore punk, a bit faster paced than the bands of the old school, but faster is better in my eyes.  One of my current favorites, I'd recommend it to any punk fan.
Lamp's Rating:  A