DILLINGER ESCAPE PLAN
Ire Works
(Relapse)

ROSETTA
Wake/Lift
(Translation Loss)

OM
Pilgrimage
(Southern Lord)

SICK PORKY
Ancestral
(Zonda)

RED LIMO
Soulful Attack EP
(Self-Released)

AUTOMATIC 7
At Funeral Speed 

(Mental)

DON'T MESS WITH 
TEXAS
Los Dias de Junio

(Moonlee)

MORE REVIEWS

I loved the album title, so I was expecting something much more, how do you say? Heavy? Instead I got melodic punk rock, with greasy sideburns, a chock full of gel in one hand and a crappy boom box on the other. I’ll come out clean now, I guess. Not a big fan of the pop punk thing here. It just doesn’t do it for me. But like I always say; good music will prevail! Or is that Filter’s motto? Regardless, Automatic 7 sounds like a shitload of decent punk bands. Face to Face comes to mind. Bad Religion comes to mind. The Clash they wish came to mind, but it doesn’t.  As good as Face to Face is, Automatic 7 indeed is. Maybe even better than seven New Found Glory’s put together in a blender. And with more wrinkled skin too.  As the story goes, Automatic 7 has been together for over a decade. I am not surprised then by how professional and mature At Funeral Speed sounds. Or some of it.

Automatic 7 put out a self-titled album back in 1995 through BYO Records which eventually landed the band a deal ('huge deal' reads their bio) with Atlantic Records. Those were the times when Green Day and the Offspring exploded onto the stereos of middle, upper and lower America, a situation that had much to do with MTV’s mind controlling.  Fast forward a couple of years and their huge deal went sour. Vagrant then picked up the band’s 2000’s Beggar Life. Seven years later comes At Funeral Speed via Oregon’s Mental Records.  At least for the first half of it, this California trio delivers well-written, well-played, aggressive but catchy and immediate melodic punk rock.  Then the record gets lazy, the songs lose clarity and as a result half of At Funeral Speed is mere filler. It’s been seven years since their previous record, more than enough time to make of this a better record.

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