With unharvested crops stretching out in both directions, it could have been an Amtrak in the heart of America, but it was a plain, meticulously- kept train in Southern Sweden. The guy sitting across from me kept looking at me like he wanted to say something, but didn't know what.

He was Swedish, like most of the people on the train, but he also looked like he could have been on that Amtrak: the rim on his San Jose Sharks cap was so bent that the ends almost touched the corners of his eyes; the paper cup he held was the receptacle for the runny entrails of a massive wad of Copenhagen he was chewing on; the shit on his kickers gave away that he was some kind of field hand or rancher. If it weren't for his turquoise linen pant- sportcoat combo and his black t-shirt, I'd have sworn he was from Iowa.

"You're from the United States," he finally belted out in near- perfect English.

"Yes I am," I answered less than enthusiastically. That was all the recognition he needed to talk me up for the duration of the ride.

His curiosity for all things red, white and blue was flattering, if somewhat bizarre and exasperating-- Flattering because, as an American, I need my ego stroked constantly (which it hadn't been for a while), bizarre because he forced me to alternate between questions of Clint Black's vocal superiority over Garth Brooks' and the untimely demise of Tupac Shakur, and exasperating because his ideas of America were straight off the television. "One of these days I'll go to Texas and see real Cowboys," he said.

His curiosity was an oddity, but it was also strangely common among the Swedes. They're curious people, but they're also morose (not surprising, considering that Sweden has the world's highest suicide rate). Half the people I met talked like philosophers when addressing each other, but became giddy around an American tourist.

My new friend on the train was no exception, and he shed light on the situation: "Swedes love outsiders, but most of them never take the time to befriend their own neighbors." It's a nation of people who wish they were somewhere else and someone else.

Psycore wished they were somewhere else so much that once they cashed their first band check they moved somewhere else-- London, to be exact. It makes sense since the only hint of Swede that leaks out of Your Problem is the scripted idealism of a hardcore metal band trying to be exactly that.

Powered by a bass line more overpowering than a B-17 propellor buzz at close range, Psycore can rattle your skull with the best of them. Heck, Pantera can only dream that any one of their songs was as burly as Psycore's opening track "I Go Solo." And Henry Rollins has a big fan in lead speaker Markus Jaan; his influence is all over this record-- in Jaan's self- loathing act, in the brooding recitation, and in the hoarse- scream mantras that comprise Your Problem. Problem is, years of proper English lessons have endowed Jaan with such good syntax that he can't help but sound plastic when venting such lyrics as "Next time I'll be gone when/ the shit hits the fan."

Now, you can take Psycore seriously, or you can look at them as one step removed from visceral. The high bpm and ginsu guitar chops wreak havoc on amps, but it's all too premeditated to do any damage off a sound stage. So, let's call it kitsch- core. After all, what other than pie- eyed TV idealism could turn a song called "Chocolate Milkshake" into an ear- bleeding mosher, or possess a band this ravaged to chant "Give it up for the boys in the band" on the manic "Tune In, Turn On, Drop Dead"?

The defining moment of Psycore's theatrical rage is the chorus of "Fullblood Freak"-- "Slam/ Goddamn/ Get off your ass and jam"-- and its downbeat continuation "The Fullblood Sequel"-- "Slam/ Goddamn/ Get off your butt and jam." You can look at it as a helplessly cheesy lyric in the midst of otherwise raging songs, or you can take it for what it is: a helplessly optimistic anthem that can restore your faith in metal as well as make you realize that Americans would be a whole lot more innocent if they all lived in Sweden.

-Shan Fowler