Refused
Freedom
Epitaph Records (2015)
Sounds Like: At the Drive-In, Converge, Fugazi, Quicksand
Score: 8.5/10
This year has been a good time to be a Refused fan, especially if you live here in Vegas. Teetering on the edge of having their set cut because of nature’s persistence to keep punks from having fun by way of rain and lightning, the band was able to go on and effortlessly power through a soaking set at Punk Rock Bowling this year. They have followed that up by releasing Freedom, their first album in 17 years. A deed that few bands have accomplished successfully.
You have to enter the right frame of mind before giving Freedom a listen. Younger finds who might not be familiar with the Swedish punk act’s catalogue and their incalculable impact on music, will probably not find anything new in the album. The phrase “this sounds like” would invade any thought they garnished from listening to it, not knowing that Refused is the reason any of the bands they’ve managed to name even exist. 1998’s, The Shape of Punk to Come, was a musical Big Bang. A product of its environment in the late 90s. A hybrid of sounds and genres fueled by an originality that is incomparable.
Freedom lays out its masterplan with the opening track, “Elecktra,” as vocalist Dennis Lyxzén screams “nothing has changed” behind a guitar riff that echoes the better parts of speed metal icons, Megadeth (if there ever was any). The drumming is, for lack of a better and more exciting term, fucking gnarly. The engineering makes it sound as if David Sandström was in the room with you, while the unorthodox timing follows the drumming ideology I like to associate with The Dismemberment Plan: erratic yet groovy.
The band’s non-conformism on Freedom is still as relevant and persistent as it was on Shape of Punk to Come. “Françafrique” starts off with a choir of children singing, “exterminate the brutes / exterminate all the brutes.” The best line of the record, found on “Dawkin’s Christ” will be much appreciated by any punk who grew up in an extremely religious household, “I got Judas’ heart / Nietzsche’s soul / Dawkin’s cock in a god-shaped hole.”
“War on the Palaces” has an intro very eerie to The Cult’s “For the Animals.” The guitars then proceed into an almost hair-metal-like riff embroidered with flange throughout.
Within the many things that have changed in the 17 years since their last release, and for a band that’s known for breaking genre barriers, Freedom lacks the youthful experimentation they once masterfully honed. The musical technicality, the political rage, the throbbing riffs. Everything is there, perfectly wrapped into three-minute bursts. Besides the few times a drum machine and synthesizer are used, the album as a whole has a pretty basic assortment of instrumentation. Granted, they get the job done, it leaves lots of space for unimaginable sonic sounds only these Swedish punks could orchestrate.
Any previous Refused fans will be flooded with emotions upon first listen. Any new fans will now be initiated into a world of songs that will stay with you for years. Freedom is a solid album from start to finish. It’s not a nostalgia trip, it’s a preview into what the band is still capable of. It’s a change from all the tame and blandness of the bands trying to get attention from Burger Records. No reverb-dependent twang in poorly constructed love songs. At the end of the day, it just feels much better to live in a world where Refused is still turning out great music. If we can somehow get David Sandström and local drumming maniac Micah Malcolm in a room together for a drum off, we will all be happier and live a little longer.
-Alan Madrigal
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