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Title: Well...it's F-Minus.
Review: It must be a characteristic of Steve Albini to slow-down the music on every recording he produces (see Leftover Crack's new album). Regardless of the change in speed, F-Minus are just as aggressive as ever on "Wake Up Screaming." The riffs are heavy, the raw attack on the drums adds to the heaviness, the vocals are pure "punk-rock." The finished product has a violence and murkiness to it befitting a nightmare.The flaw: 15 songs which are more lengthy than past tracks, in a bad way. The tempo is slower, so as verse/chorus is repeated the music loses it's power. What makes F-Minus so great is their ability to blast out fully structured songs in less than a minute.Positives: The lyrics are good, as always. And throughout the album there seems to be a recurrence of random haunting feedback, which I think totally adds to their garage-punk sound. And a few special moments of in-studio mistakes carelessly unedited, like the ending to "Controversy."Overall, a 4-star album.
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