The Fixtures: Devil's Playground

Politics and music often form a shaky alliance, sometimes working in provocative ways, but more often just falling flat. The members of The Fixtures, lamentably, fall closer to the latter model. Their hearts are certainly in the right (or left) place, but they don't have the power to pull it off. Lead singer Kevin—who, like Phil Collins of Genesis, is hidden behind the drum kit—sounds appropriately angry, wailing like Jello Biafra or shouting like the lead guy in Neurosis. The music, however, doesn't sound very angry; instead, it mostly blasts out the same indistinguishable punk riffs with few exceptions. "Life's too short to be quiet," he sings in "One Last Quiet Song," but then again, life is too short to dwell on the intended meaning of monotonous hardcore.