Andrew Jackson Jihad - Knife Man

There are a few things you need to know about Andrew Jackson Jihad if you don't know them already:

1. Although they're an acoustic duo at their core, their albums often feature other instruments such as drums, kazoos and accordions. This means even if you see them play a song live, that doesn't mean it will sound exactly like that whenever they get around to recording it.

2. They like to use a lot of morbid and hyper-sarcastic imagery. Like, almost excessively. To the point where people sometimes either miss the sarcasm and get offended, or just plain get offended. They don't do this with every song, but they do it more often than not.

3. Given their acoustic status and their association with Asian Man Records, they're often referred to as a folk punk band. I think they take it so much further than that though. If anything, Modern Americana would do it, but they experiment with traditional folk sounds, some jazzy stuff, some bluesy noises and even straight up rock songs. Especially with each new album as they add in new sounds.

Now that you are armed with this knowledge, you're ready to listen to Andrew Jackson Jihad. Knife Man continues the expansion of sounds from Can't Maintain, but I find that it in terms of lyrics the album finds a nice balance of the "finding the beauty in ugly things" from Can't Maintain and the "in-your-face anti-PCness" of Cap Guns & Candy Cigarettes and People Who Can Eat People Are the Luckiest People in the World.

In other words, this is essentially the ultimate Andrew Jackson Jihad album. I still recommend all of them, but this might be the best place for a beginner to start to get a full scope of what the band is all about.


Also, this is the best song ever:

American Tune 

Just listen to the lyrics and you'll understand the second

thing that I said that you should know about them.

25 Albums. #07: The Acoustic EP by Against Me!

First things first. I realize this is an EP. I also realize that this is technically self titled. Moving on.

I love Against Me!. In high school I had all those typical conflicting feelings about the band, but I've given up on trying to hate them for the sake of hating them. There are some songs I think are stupid, but I'm not afraid to admit that I still like some of their newer releases.

That said, the Acoustic EP is still my favorite Against Me! release. It's raw and powerful enough to grab my attention and short enough to not get boring. This was still when Tom Gabel was still finding his voice, so some cuts are stronger than others (his vocals on "Reinventing Axl Rose" are pretty high up there in range in comparison to other songs) but The Acoustic EP doesn't have a bad track which is saying something because I've found faults with at least one song on every other album.

I rank it as an album that had a profound effect on me because it was the first folk punk release that I had really enjoyed. I was aware of a few bands of the genre, but Against Me! was the best. Their song writing was fluid, the musicianship was tight and the production was slick, but still pleasant to the ear. Those were all the same reasons I loved Minor Threat more than every other hardcore band. It was love upon first listen.

I don't think I'm really doing this EP justice. For me though, it's the pinnacle of folk punk. Highly recommended.