Hives
Veni Vidi Vicious
[Burning Heart/Epitaph; 2000; r: Sire; 2002]
Rating: 7.4
The Hives, the safest garage band in the world today, have already conquered
Sweden and are now preparing to take America with their so-called 'punk rock
avec kaboom.' Like the Ramones-- if there had already been a Ramones
before them-- or a Stooges who learned to make noise and then showed no more
curiosity about it, the Hives dish out power-punk that's totally predictable,
but will knock your ass around your hips and blow the gel out of your hair.
The Hives are as tight as their groupies' pleather miniskirts, and they run as
smoothly as a Japanese sports coupe: zippy, efficient, and they never need to
go in for repairs. Drummer Chris Dangerous bangs the skins like a helicopter,
and Howlin' Pelle Almqvist has a steady scream, with just one gimmick: every
so often he lets his voice crack into a yelp, like someone just kicked him.
"Got ouAYYYEt wayAYYE late... in 200AYYYYYEEE8!" The guitars are loud but a
little textbook-- when they're asked for power chords on "Main Offender," they
deliver exactly like you'd expect. And those chords have made "Main Offender"
their big worldwide single, though for my money "Outsmarted" has the better
hook and will get you jumping higher. Plus, instead of "outsmarted," it sounds
like they sing "I farted," which is almost avant-garde in its crassness compared
to the genteel 1950s tone of the other lyrics.
Veni Vidi Vicious was first released two years ago and immediately took
Sweden by storm, but it's just now breaking in the States. The band is riding
on the coattails of the garage-rock revival, though this band has been at it
since the Strokes were too young to understand their own name: nine years, dating
back to when they were teenagers. Fans of the quintet's debut, Barely Legal,
will notice that the Hives have slowed a little with age. That album sounded
more like straight suburban hardcore, and the great early song titles like
"a.k.a. I-D-I-O-T" and "Hail Hail Spit 'n' Drool" gave way to the comparatively
wizened "Die, All Right!" and "Knock Knock." Not to mention "Supply and Demand,"
which even predicts their fame in post-Strokes America. Kicking off with the
monster-movie chords of "The Hives - Declare Guerre Nucleaire," they bang through
twelve tunes in thirty minutes-- some of them indistinguishable from one another,
but at that pace who cares?
As on Barely Legal, all of the songs spring from 'Randy Fitzsimmons,'
the only mysterious thing about the band. The mythology of the Hives states
that Fitzsimmons is the Svengali-like manager who got them together and writes
their material. Hundreds of people are arguing right now about who Fitzsimmons
is and whether he's real: if it's an actual guy using a pseudonym, or a guy who
has that name but can't be found, or if one or all of the Hives write everything
and they just made up the name. Even New Musical Express has weighed in
on this issue (they think it's guitarist Nicholaus Arson). Maybe the story is
some kind of statement, their way of half-jokingly saying they're a manufactured
supergroup-- a Swedish punkcore N*SYNC. Not that it matters much; this is
punk rock, not the Dead Sea Scrolls.
But the Fitzsimmons legend also reveals what's flawed about the band-- that
they sound like five guys who took up garage-rock, instead of a band that
actually played in a garage. Instead of coming from noise and chaos, they're
rooted in pastiche and show business-- especially on their one midtempo song,
the 50s pop knockoff "Find Another Girl." Your parents might dig this album as
much as you do. For that reason, I like them both a little more and a little
less than their supposed peers-- they're more entertaining, but maybe less fun.
When they tour the States in the next couple of months, I'm going to check my
own theory on who Fitzsimmons is: I'm betting he's the guy that meets them
backstage, sticks the wind-up keys in their backs and tightens their springs to
the breaking point before dropping them in front of the crowd. "FAAAAAYYYYEEind
another girl! ALL RIGHT!"
-Chris Dahlen, April 25th, 2002