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 | PennywiseLand of the Free?2001 Epitaph 
  Review by: Chris See others by this writer ![[staff]](/images/icons/staffsticker.gif){kind=icon}
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Published on June 20th 2001
It seems all I've been hearing about this new Pennywise album for the last 6 months is "blah blah political", "blah blah best-ever", "blah blah sounds like their old stuff". Naturally, being a Pennywise fan myself for quite some time now, I had to get the new album immediatley and judge for myself. Let me start by syaing if you got into Pennywise during the popularity of "Straight Ahead", then you may want to stop reading now. This album is much faster, louder and pissed off than you would like. "LOTF" starts off with 'Time Marches On', which is unquestionably one of the album's best tracks. Fletcher's work on the guitar has you imagining that he probably went through a couple packs of guitar strings trying to record this one. And Jim's vocal's keep up with this harder, faster pace. The title track, 'Land of the Free', is another that will have you in amazement of the rebirth of old-school Pennywise. Play attention to Byron's drumming on this one, simply incredible. If every album has a track that stands out as one you can imagine being performed at almost every show, 'Fuck Authority' is it. The guitars, drumming and Jim's vocals have made this an instant Pennywise classic. The chrorus, "I say fuck authority, silent majority, raised by the system, now it's time to rise against them", is one of the punkest statements I think the band has ever made. And along with the bullshit displayed by the retards of West Hollywood, this song will a crowd pleaser whereever Pennywise plays. Other noteworthy tracks include 'The World', 'Something Wrong with Me', 'Whose on your side' (which was co-written by Mr. 'Punker-than-you' Brett Gurewitz), 'Set Me Free' and 'Anyone Listening'. After listening to this album about 7 or 8 times since I got it, I still can't figure out one thing. What pissed off Pennywise so much? Sure its a rotten world, but these guys have gone cynical. Its a good move though. This album will have you thinking fond memories of the first time you listend to "About Time" or "Unknown Road". All in all, this is a damn good album. Not the best Pennywise ever, but a must have for both diehard Pennywise fans and people who like music that doesn't suck. People who liked this also liked:           Please login or register to post comments. What are the benefits of having a Punknews.org account?
I like some pennywise, this is the only CD I own of theirs, and probably the only one I'll ever buy, its so bland, and the songs just kind of blend into each other. Straight up boring, and my friends say that their CD's all sound the same, so, I'm not even gonna bother with anymore of their CD's. Pennywise is on of the best stuff i herd in a long time ooyeah This CD is fucking lame. Incredibly fucking lame. It make sme want to vomit that people actually take these middle age men having a sudden punk rebirth seriously. Their lyrics show as much political knowledge as a kindergarten finger painting. this is undoubtibley the best cd from pennywise to date. They now have a more in your face approch and tell it like it is. The drums in this album are increddible, they just blew me away. And what i really liked was the chemistry that worked out so well between the bass, and the vocals of jim. Jim does a great job of getting feeling in threw his lyrics and I hope that more is to come of this band...o and by the way this is the band that first got me going in the direction of hardcore punk.....punk rock isnt dead this is their best album since full circle, but sickboi is a moron. This is an ok CD, nowhere near the level of About Time. But moving on to the other comments. ... I'm getting really annoyed with some of the elitist attitudes people are displaying here. Bro-core, jock rock, whatever. Some people like to move on after they first get into punk, they then try to distance themselves from the masses by listening to more and more extreme bands. So they try their hand at mathcore or grindcore or some kind of core and then proceed to scoff at the bands who get them into the music in the first place. No, Pennywise isn't breaking any boundaries or doing anything crazy and out of the ordinary, but they do their style of music well. They have added some slower elements with songs like Alien but they get called sell-outs or commercial for changing. Yet the same person will gripe about them not progressing. I listen to bands like Unearth, Avenged Sevenfold, Shai Hulud, Dillinger Escape Plan, and Dark Day Dawning, but I'm still able to admit that I like Pennywise, Bad Religion, and Strung Out. Get over yourselves. I'm so sick and tired of pennywise!! all their damn songs sound the same!! and they've gotten so damn commercial lately. They suck. If you people want good punk listen to satanic surfers, at the drive-in, propagandhi, etc. I got all of Pw's stuff in rapid succession 'bout 3 years ago and went through a short lived obsession. Now I found it difficult listening to Full Circle & Straight Ahead cos they are simply dead boring.(I still luv ABOUT TIME & Unknown Road though) Pennywise is turning out the same old shit and becoming progrssively worse. To think I used to like them. It will take a lot of change to get the next Pennywise CD on my stereo. Very, very awesome CD. I can't compare it to their other CDs, since this is the only one I've got, but by itself, I really love it! Stop the phoney mtv-punk... Give PUNK back it's meaning... It's power to make people think about the wold and themselves, instead of talking about lost girlfriends and stuff... (I mean sum41 etc should drop dead and their blood to be used to spraypaint walls with messages with meaning) What the fuck is with some of you people ?!?! ..... When a band experiments with a new sound you jump all over them and say they should just make an album that sounds like their older ones (ie. Bad Religion, Greenday, Rancid, AFI & many others). But then when a band sticks with a sound that they are good with you still slag them off for that (ie. Pennywise in this case). THERE IS NO PLEASING YOU FUCKWITS!! Pennywise albums basically sound the same. But you'll notice a direct relation with pennywise albums sounding the same and pennywise albums kicking major ass. This is awesome to mosh to and lift weights with the boys!! where is my white hat? ! Well, I'm new to this whole hardcore punk (if that's what you call it) thing... until recently I had only heard "mainstream punk" (Green Day, etc). Then a friend introduced me to Bad Religion (which I immediately fell in love with and have already bought 4 BR CDs). And I heard that Pennywise was cool, but hadn't heard any of their songs until my friend bought "Land of the Free?", which I borrowed and I absolutely love it! i think that this album sounds a bit different then other pennywise but its still basically just the same as any other album so it doesnt matter if u buy this one or full circle. Oh man this album is sooooo sweet. Man to me this album is to pennywise as "Punk in Drublic" is to NOFX. This is going into my top 5 all time best CD's. Not one slow song on this album. It's all good form beggining to end. It makes me want to shout "Fuck Auhority!" Shut up. It's obviously a matter of personal opinion, and by the looks of it, one you are outnumbered on. No. If you listen to Pennywise...just stop. Haha, you're making statistics... OK you want percentages? heres some fucking percentages.. Man who really cares how many fast or slow pennywise songs there are...Ive listen to them since '91 and they havent dissapointed me yet. Punk rock is not all about the speed of the music...its mostly the attitude that you carry with it. Pennywise will always fucking kick ass! Did anyone see the Pennywise commercial on during this week's Jackass? pennywise is the ACDC of Punk Rock...they've been playing the same song for about 6 or 7 albums now. Enough fucking percents. Listin to the Casualties or Pantera if you want breakneck fast. Pennywise albums are good music whether slow, mid tempo, or fast. I know I really should have something better to do, but anyway. Here's the fastest songs BPMs compared. I got the BPMs from AnalogX TapTempo (http://www.analogx.com) so they are not exact. My knowledge about music theory is kinda limited but I suppose all the fast parts are double-time (Like 180 BPM is actually 360 if you'd like) God damn, you people have too much fuckin' time, if you rellay want to analyze this album, look at the fast songs on it versus the fast songs on 'straight ahead', the 'straight ahead' faster songs have that "pop-punk" fastness, 'lotf' songs have those faster drum beats, so please don't try to discredit my writing if you're gonna sound like a moron. (i.e.anarchyburger) By fast I meant that most of the main verses and choruses are fast, Greed has a long slow intro and outro. A song is as fast as the fastest part.. I know this really doesn't make much sense arguing if some song is fast or not.. Speed is relative.. oh , sorry , i made lot of writing mistakes - my keyboard is damaged ! Hey ! You wanna know what pennywise pisses off ? Perhaps a rassistic President , Hich School Massacres , Fucking egoismus or The missunderstanding of Violence out there ? I dont like it when every Bands political , cause its good to have some personal lyrics too , but they want to mhave a message with their lyrics . some people have way to much time on thier hands well anarchyburger i haven't heard all of either cd. But i have heard greed, and that is NOT fast. typo, I meant (52 -> 50).. This has to be the most pointless post I've ever made here, but here it goes anyway. I like Straight Ahead more than Land Of The Free, even though I got into PW after "About Time" came out. I tend to like faster songs more, so I was kind of surprised when I read this: Land of the Free is really great!!! 10 times better than Straight Ahead! The vocals at some songs have too much filters, but itīs alright. To all thoose people that says that pennywise is always the same, so what? NOFX, Bad Religion, No Motiv, and a lot of other bands are the same.. itīs not a problem since when did pennywise become a political activist band?anyway, this album is pretty good, the best songs are 'wto' 'set me free' 'the world' and 'it's up to you'. some of the songs suck, but overall, a decent cd. it might be their worst album, but that's cause everything in the past has been absoultely great, including 'straight ahead'.- fathead This is another kick-ass PW album. It dosent seem to have the same emotion as there earlier stuff but its still good. The more that i here it, the more i like it. I'm just glad they never sold out, and still write about stuff they believe in! Theres worse stuff to blast. Pennywise is a good band. Progressive or not. Weezer is not punk I hate all the people complaining that pennywise just records the same album again and again, so what if you dont like them dont listen to them and leave the people who do enjoy thier music alone, there are alot worse bands to listen to than pennywise. I never liked 'em that much until this album. Good stuff. i'm enjoying the cd. but i'm a little disappointed, i heard it was supposed to be super-charged pick meltingly fast. it's a lot more hard but i don't see it being as fast as their old stuff. over all, it's a fine cd. i highly recommend buying it. Usually a bands best work coems when it's a band doing what it knows best. And this is Pennywise doing what they knwo best. Most times when a band changes a style the album usally isn't that good anyway. Can you tell me Bad Relgions "Into the Unknown" was their best? O NOFX "Heavy Petting Zoo"? Or Green Days "Warning"? or even Rancids "Life Wont Wait" (A good album, but not the best) Sometimes when a band experiments it can be a masterpiece (London Calling, Out come the Wolves) or just crap (Americana). Repetitive? Yes. Stale or forced? No. At least they enjoy making that music over and over again. I think it would be a bad move if they now tried to add ska or pop or rap or anything else to their sound. If Pennywise was just out to please the masses they could've whored themselves out years ago. The reason Epitaph hypes Pennywise so much his because they are one of Epitaphs biggest bands and helped (along with others) to put Epitaph where it is today. If Pennywise are gonna experiment what are they going to do it with? Damnit, do you people want Pennywise to go hire a horn section, keyboards, and tuba-player. Progressionally maybe they're somewhat like MXPX, but then again not at all. MXPX changed their sound with their latest record to a much more radio-friendly, overproduced, cleaned up skippy pop-punk sound. Nothing like the new Pennywise album. I'll admitt Pennywise don't evolve much, but so what. It's good music and at least their not slowing down for the masses. Why can't this band write new songs?!? Pennywise puts out a fairly good album...but they do it over and over and over again. There has been no progression at all since unknown road, and it's all the same riff, same stale preachy lyrics etc. They're basically the same as MxPx, but with a different tired sound. i like pennywise. i like this cd. New album is good, better than the last one anyway. But its not great, and when youve listened to it for awhile you grow tired. I can't speak for everyone, but the reason I hate Pennywise so much is the fact that every new album they put out sounds exactly the same as the last one. Sometimes they make it faster, or slower, but overall, the sound remains the same. I didn't think that "Land of the free" was a terrible album. It was the single most blatant occurance of over hyping that epicrap has ever done. I don't need to hear about it every time I go to their webpage. It seems like weekly updates of "The album is still coming out on June 19th" could have been better spent hyping other albums that they were putting out. If you're into pennywise, buy the album. If you thought their last 4 releases have been kinda stale, you won't be surprised with this 'un. Wow. What can I say? Another classic PW record. If anyone thought they were softening up after hearing Straight Ahead, you're in for quite a surprise. Ranks right up there with Full Circle, and by far the best sounding Pennywise record to date. Simply, this album is is Pennywise using everything they know to maximum effect. The band is still trudging forward, and in my opinion is yet to make a dissappointing album. Sure it's nothing that new, but at least they haven't softened up or tried to be something they're not. All in all this album does not dissappoint like many of the other albums released recently by the other "big" punk bands.(NOFX, Bad Religion, Green Day, Offspring) Sorry about the typos kids.... |
