Authority Zero - A Passage In Time (Cover Artwork)

Authority Zero

A Passage In Time (2002)

Lava


Imagine that you made a mix tape of the following bands; Bad Religion, Blink 182, Pennywise, and Sublime and that's a pretty good idea what listening to Authority Zero's new album was like. This band out of Arizona plays a really good mix of skate/pop/ska punk usually never allowing two songs in a row to sound the same and occasionally changing styles in the middle of a song. The lyrics though out mostly follow the skate punk staple of doing your own thing and overcoming struggles ("Passage In Time [listen to the verse in this one and tell me that it doesn't sound like it was taken directly from "Society"]," "Over Seasons" and "Everyday"), but others have the need to fall back on silly-dumb lyrics ("Super Bitch" and "Good Old Days") which just seemed to distract from the decent music earlier. This band also mixes up styles and languages on "LA Surf" which is a Dick Dale sounding song sung entirely in Portuguese.

Overall I thought that this album is a pretty good, especially if you are new to punk, and are looking for a band to get into just as they are getting big. I really enjoyed the ska-influence songs, which had a strong Sublime influence to them, but still contained enough originality that it didn't just sound like a rip-off. I also liked that while listening to this album it was almost like I was listening to a comp made up of several bands instead of one band's album. Good use of variety and mixing of styles, and fairly easy to get into, I'd recommend this disc for fans of skate or ska-punk especially fans of Sublime and Pennywise.