Stereotyperider
“Under the Influence”
(Suburban Home)
Clever title, since these are all cover songs being performed by Stereotyperider. So essentially, if you love this band, you’ll dig this CD. If you know nothing about the indie rock/slightly punk Stereotyperider, I’m not sure why you’d go out and get this. I mean, it rocks some covers well, most notably, The Cure’s “Jumping Someone Else’s Train” which is given an amped up makeover. Seaweed’s “Crush Us All” is done some justice. Hell, they even pulled off a cover of “Lie and Wait” by Quicksand, and man, you just can’t fuck with Quicksand, but the band managed to pull it off.
So while I can really only recommend this for fans of the band, I will give Stereotyperider props for pulling off such a self-indulgent release with covers that are actually worth listening to. They also get points for style as the other songs remade are from bands like Archers of Loaf, Fugazi, The Pixies and the Decendents. Ok, ok, we all get it. You guys are indie cred all the way. No need to record an album to prove it. But at least you did it really well with top-notch choices in material to cover and I don’t get that ‘offended’ feeling we often get when bands butcher good songs.
