(hed) pe - Only in Amerika (CD)

All Music Guide

According to no less an authority than band point man Jahred, getting the boot from Jive was the best thing that ever happened to [hed] pe. "Finally we've been released," he wrote in January '04 to fans on [hed]'s official website. "Now it's time to get back to some real dirtyass sht" And he wasn't kidding. Only in Amerika is the Cali combo's 2005 debut for Koch. Raunchy and abrasive, its thrashhop spew takes cues from Anthrax, Korn, Dirty South, preacting career IceT, and the uncompromising Psychopathic Records collective. The powerful melodies and layered production of 2003's Blackout are gone Amerika features the relentless halftime pace of exOtep drummer Moke, stabs of enormous guitar, and dropins from DJ Product. Jahred's choppy, halfyelled rhymes are ever defiant, but they're also chaotic to the point of ineffectiveness. In the space of just a few lines he promotes marijuana, insults women and homosexuals, condemns Al Qaeda, defends the first amendment, and calls out the record ...industry. The rapmetal hybrid "War" is nationalism at gutlevel. "Don't you want your freedom?" Jahred asks in the rallying chorus, and then lists clubgoing, casual sex, and smoking weed as American points of pride. (And for the evildoers, a message: "We got guns and sht/You're all lame.") "Box" is one of the album's more cohesive tracks, driving the swagger of its hiphop verses through a giant guitardriven chorus. And the slinky, pounding percussion and callandresponse lyrical structure of "Raise Hell" is a bludgeoning amplification of Lil Jon's crunk style, its tag line even cribbing from Jon's 2002 single "I Don't Give A...." Latealbum entries "Amerikan Beauty" and "Chicken" are interesting musically, but they're overrun by social apathy and misogyny. And ultimately that's the issue with Only in Amerika. It wants to be a confrontational megaphone in the ear of conservatives, but Jahred's torrential rhetoric is too messy and blatantly offensive to incite anything but superficial anger, and the music though occasionally explosive takes a backseat to the ranting. [hed] pe diehards will love this Amerika, but it speaks only to their niche. - Johnny Loftus, All Music Guide Read more Less