The Business - Hardcore Hooligan (CD)

All Music Guide

It's street punk, and the lads love it. Veterans The Business return with twelve more pintslinging anthems to the working class and football terraces, rife with gang's all here singalongs and clogged with hardbarbed, brutally simplistic punk chording. Within the first four minutes, you're greeted with no less than two bawdy singalongs. "FU FUC FUCK FK YOU", the rousing opening theme "Hardcore Hooligan" goes, to be ended by the cheers and jeers of the boys at the bar. But that's only the first minuteandahalf. What about "Southgate [Euro '96]", with its snarky putdowns of Premier League defender Gareth Southgate? The melody to "Lord of the Dance" is hijacked, and the supporters lock their arms and sing. "Dance now wherever you may be/'Cuz he missed the fin' penalty" The No Mercy For You holdover "Guinness Boys" throws some rollicking pub piano on the pitch, while "Maradona" and "England 5, Germany 1" are muscular and meanspirited numbers with a large debt to the sloppy pacing of the Sex ...Pistols. Hooligans' aims are pretty clear then, even before the opening strains of "Viva Bobby Moore" there isn't much room for the unit's usual calls for anarchy, unless there's a fistfight with rival footy supporters and you want to put a trash bin through a windsreen. This singularity makes Hooligans a perfect soundtrack for the activities so heartily described within it to review, those are drinking, fighting, and watching football but rather ineffective for anything else. In fact, without these lusty vices as a thread, Hardcore Hooligans would border badly on retread. Mickey Fitz and his pals have been at it for over twenty years, after all. Fortunately for them, thickheaded Sham 69 riffs and prideful football rallying cries never really go out of style. Like baconflavored crisps, you either love them or hate them. - Johnny Loftus, All Music Guide Read more Less