Blue Monday - What's Done Is Done

I want to be upfront; I do not listen to hardcore, with the exception of the obligatory Minor Threat. Thus, I struggled a while when listening to the debut from Blue Monday. At first listen, I did not enjoy it. I thought that was because I was not appreciating it, so I looked into other hardcore and did some real soul-searching through this process. Here is what I came up with: I still don't like it. I kept searching for some musical value, or emotion evoked, and the 22 minutes of this album did not make me feel anything but impatient, or even coerce me into feeling the plight of the meaning behind the lyrics. Repetition, uncharacteristic guitars, lack of a stellar beat or rhythm section and overproduction dominate this album. For such organized mayhem, it sounds too polished. Lyrics are intense, explicit, self-deprecating, and mostly targeted at someone who has betrayed the writer. However, I don’t usually buy a album just to curl up with the liner notes. Most repetitive lines do dot hammer the point home, but seem to be the standard, keep shouting in a rhythmic fashion to get the point across (see “Number One”)... but in fact sound, well, repetitive. A benefit of listening to this album would be to support the Vancouver hardcore scene, which apparently is on the brink of blowing up, or to perhaps regain a sense of mediocrity. Otherwise, it is probably just better to stick to the hardcore that influenced Blue Monday, which according to them, are DYS and Negative Approach. My foray into the hardcore genre will begin elsewhere. [www.bluexmonday.com]