Hellstomper--Fine...Forget It
Steel Cage 2004
Friends, it is with heavy heart I must inform you the mighty Hellstomper are no more. That's the bad news. The good news is King and crew have blessed us with one last slab of outlaw punk glory in Fine...Forget It. Not only is this disc the band's best, it foreshadows what's to come from the wreckage of this split. The future looks great, let me tell you.
It has been said many times before and it bears repeating--Hellstomper are the best there ever were at merging punk and Southern rock. Fine...Forget It further drives that point home. However, this swan song sports an injected power set, thanks to a fully realized production job. Also, Hellstomper have never been as tight as they are here. Far from the ragged thuggishness of their previous works, Fine ...Forget It sees these guys finally transformed into the arena ruling beast they were always destined to become. It's an inspired listen that makes the band's demise that much more disappointing.
Unlike Hellstomper's other records, there are no covers on Fine...Forget It--100% original material, front to back. The results are so impressive it makes you wonder if those past moments of interpreting outside stuff were a squandering of space. The opening "Just Another Day On The Road" sees the boys expanding their style a tad, some vintage Judas Priest vibe creeping in on the riff along with the band's usual reference points. You get five songs deep before Hellstomper break into full-swing boogie mode, but once they do it comes in the nice block of "O.N.S.," "Mexas," and the anti-poseur "Don't Sing My Songs." That said, the best of the ass shakers drops on "Baby's Outta Jail," our heroes coming off like the ZZ Top of the new millennium. Really, "Flyin' High And Nowhere Bound" is the pick of the litter, though. Beyond generally being a classic Hellstomper secimen, this track may ultimately be the band's defining moment--a total winner.
If you're gonna go out, do so on top. With Fine...Forget It, Hellstomper have done just that. Not only is this a spectacular goodbye, it's the perfect bridge between this band and the newly formed Polecat Boogie Revival (featuring 3/4 of Hellstomper). If you're new to these guys, this is a fine place to start. Diehards, rest easy knowing that the fellas have delivered their best effort with this last strike. As killer as Fine...Forget It is, nobody will be forgetting Hellstomper any time in the near future. Thanks for the rock, gentlemen.
Score this CD directly from STEEL CAGE
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