Wario Land 3 is the point @ which the Wario Land series finally reaches its fullest potential, combining the clever status effect mechanic, where getting hit by certain enemies gives Wario certain effects like floating upward or falling down thin platforms, — & including new ones that are some o’ the best in the series, like turning invisible, turning into a yarn ball, turning into a snowball, or turning into a vampire who can become a bat & fly — which can be positive or negative for the player depending on the context, with a more open, explorative level than the mostly linear levels Wario Land II offered.
Rather than going on a sequence o’ levels with goals with a few secret exits & branching paths as the 2nd game, this game goes all the way with breaking from traditional platformers with a unique goal system: each level has 4 different-colored pairs o’ chests & keys. Collecting a matching key & then chest o’ the same color acts as 1 goal that gives the player a certain treasure that unlocks access to other keys & chests, whether by unlocking new levels, changing certain levels, or giving Wario new abilities. This can lead to multiple ways o’ getting certain treasures, especially in Time Attack challenges, when you have all abilities unlocked: for example, you normally get the red key & chest in “The Peaceful Village” using a snake to hoist you up to the roof; but if you have the winged boot, you can also high jump up the right wall ( which isn’t e’en getting into the collision glitch you can use to clip up that wall near the beginning o’ the game & the other glitches you can use the heavily sequence break this game like Metroid games ).
With this mo’ elaborate gameplay mechanic comes mo’ elaborate levels, with levels that branch out into different sections for the different treasures, not unlike Super Mario 64’s levels. This does lead to some repetition like in Super Mario 64 as you have to traverse the same challenges multiple times, — with some egregious examples we will be looking @ — but this is surprisingly not much mo’ than in the 1st Wario Land or Wario Land II, which, despite being mo’ linear, repeat a lot o’ the same general challenges; & given Wario Land 3’s game design, it’s mo’ understandable here.
I have been very self-deprecating ’bout the embarrassing music I liked as a kid like Papa Roach, Skillet, & Breaking Benjamin, — tho I actually still liked the Breaking Benjamin album we listened to — but here is where I choose my battle & die on my sword: Three Days Grace — a’least the albums when they still had Adam Gontier as their lead singer — still holds up. I’m not going to sit here being all “hurr hurr, this shit was, like, so lame” pretending like this shit doesn’t still slap my ass back to the past to play some video games that suck ass. I’m not going to pretend I don’t cum all o’er myself when I hear Gontier’s grunge-light voice — that perfect balance o’ not too clean, with a li’l gravel, but not too far into the hurdy-gurdy Scott Stapp “singing while choking on a squirrel” style.
I’m also going to make the hot take that their 1st self-titled album was their best, a’least musically — it’s admittedly probably their worst lyrically. No album succeeds @ sounding as gloomy as this while still having ’nough pop sensibilities to actually be an enjoyable, catchy listen; no other album so perfectly evokes that feeling o’ a preteen sitting a dim-lit room on a rainy afternoon thinking dour thoughts for no reason ’cause their mother doesn’t believe in antidepressants or therapy. & since it’s September & autumn is starting to bring its gloomy weather here in the “Great Gray North” that is Seattle, now is the perfect time ( for me a’least: I don’t know what to tell you people near the equator where it’s probably still 30° Celsius ).
1. Burn
& we start with what I consider the best song o’ the album — & this band’s best song entirely. ¡It’s all downhill from here! This album opens with gradual crackling noise till we finally get those down-tuned guitars going in a jumping pattern, followed by thumping high hats like lightning strikes, & then some weird guitar riffs that go “WEAH-WEAH-WEAH-WEAH, WEAH-WEAH-WEAH-WEAH” while Gontier coolly sings the opening lines in his perishing alt-rock voice before bellowing out the chorus. I particularly like how the bridge solos go back to the main strumming, pause for a moment, & then start wilding out the riffs & drums & the different pitches Gontier sings the final word o’ the chorus the other 2 times he sings it.
¿But what o’ this song’s lyrics? ¿What is this song about? Beats me: as a kid I ne’er cared that much ’bout lyrics & would oft make up meanings for songs, e’en when I did know them. I’m pretty sure Arctic Monkeys’ “Crying Lightning” is ’bout a breakup or a toxic relationship, but as far as I’m concerned it’s ’bout lightning.
Let’s see what Genius has to say:
“Burn” is the riotous opening track to Three Days Grace’s eponymous album. Accompanied by clashing cymbals and thrumming bass, Adam Gontier incinerates his enemies.
¡Ha, ha, ha! That’s so cute: “Adam Gontier incinerates his enemies”. See, e’en Genius knows this song is great.
Grade: S
2. Just Like You
Unlike the previous song, I know precisely what this song is ’bout: it’s 1 o’ those cheesy “¡I’M NOT GONNA BE PART O’ YOUR SYSTEM!” songs.
But despite how cliché the lyrics are… the musical elements are just so good: that intro with those memorably downtuned riffs, the way Gontier shouts the verse lyrics, & then quietly sings the prechorus, only to build back to shouting for the chorus. The singing just has so many hooks & li’l twists that make it catchy. There’s a reason they made this a single.
The music video fits the song’s meaning, — spoiler: it’s the only 1 that does — & is the typical spooky sterile-white-clean authoritarian dystopian environment with e’eryone wearing masks; but I can’t not mention my amusement @ the fact that most o’ said masks look a bit like Trump, adding a whole new unintended interpretation decades later.
Grade: A
3. I Hate Everything About You
( Sigh ). Look, I know how cringe these lyrics are, — tho I don’t know if there were many songs with this love/hate topic when this came out, tho there were definitely many that came afterward — but musically this song is just perfect, e’ery part: the twanging opening acoustic notes, followed by drums, & then the best part, the quaking basslines while Gontier sings in that quivering voice that lingers on the final syllable, that feedback-filled guitar @ the end o’ the verses, the pause after the verse followed by rolling drums & shouted chorus, & then that chorus followed by the opening notes again but with those high “DUH, DUH, DUH, DUH-DUH-DUH” notes, the bridge, which sounds like a blend o’ the verse & chorus singing style, still quivering, but much louder…
I’m not e’en going to pretend to understand what story the music video’s trying to convey: from the looks o’ it, a bunch o’ zombie-faced teens come together to some neon-lit green valley to watch some dude get cucked while reliving the experience o’ being beaten & yelled @ by the same drunken ol’ man with a mean dog & then smashing picture frames on the ground. ¿Is it the ol’ man they both love & hate? ¿Why? ¿Is he the father to all o’ them? I’m not surprised such an abusive asshole would have such trouble keeping his shriveled dick in his pants to now spawn so many children.
I don’t think a song as simple but relatable as this needed to be given this kind o’ bizarre, abstract high concept; scenes o’ a couple yelling & fighting interspersed with footage o’ the band playing probably would’ve sufficed.
Grade: S
4. Home
This song has some strong elements, like the the guitar notes ending with that lingering echoing strum & the interesting way Gontier chances his voice’s emphasis on the verses. Howe’er, coming after the previous song, which was already ’bout a troubled relationship, this 1 feels a bit redundant & weaker. & while you could argue that all these songs are melodramatic, this 1 sounds especially so, with Gontier yelling ’bout his girlfriend turning off the TV & screaming @ him for no reason like it’s a soap opera. A’least the previous song offered a dilemma with the singer’s love/hate relationship; here the singer presents no positives to his girlfriend or living situation & gives no explanation why he doesn’t just leave. He e’en says, “I’m better off alone”. ¿So why not be alone?
Weirdly, Genius claims this song is ’bout “the heartbreaking effects of substance abuse on a relationship”, but I don’t see that: the only substance “abuse” mentioned is the singer getting stoned @ the beginning o’ verse 2, but that’s to deal with his already deteriorating relationship. Forgive me for not taking serious a dramatic song ’bout a relationship falling apart ’cause the singer kept smoking too much weed & ignoring his girlfriend to laugh @ ol’ The Three Stooges reruns. It would be an interesting twist if the singer, who seems to be presented as the sympathetic party here, is the 1 ruining the relationship: that the girlfriend is turning off the TV & yelling @ him to get up & live his life & that his griping ’bout how he’d be better off alone is his selfish hedonism — but that’s quite a leap to make.
The music video, which seems to tell 2 separate stories, 1 o’ which involves a pale-skinned “English-tittie vampire” smashing shit, including a room full o’ clocks & what looks like an owl cage ( ¡Kendrick promised no OVHOES would be harmed! ¡You lied! ), & a different story where the lead singer yells into a red payphone that is for some reason inside the ramshackle apartment in which they’re performing, adds no extra information regarding this song’s meaning.
Grade: B
5. Scared
This song’s an underrated spooky song with its memorable scare riffs with plenty o’ clashing high hats, Gontier singing the verses in a paranoid voice only to rise into a yell in the prechorus, & the muttering quietly in the bridge.
So this song, with its vague lyrics ’bout being “scared & lonely” & how he “wish you never told” him must be ’bout some deep, pathological fear, an existential dread that —
When the band arrived at one of the recording studios for the album, they were told that the place was haunted by the ghost of a little girl. The band initially dismissed the claims, but after strange occurrences during their time at the studio, the band felt more and more unnerved.
Or it’s ’bout a superstitious fear o’ the ghost o’ a child. ¿What were these “strange occurrences”, anyway? ¿A stuffed animal floating around with nobody holding it?
Anyway, the song still slaps.
Grade: A
6. Let You Down
This song’s all right. I like the rolling drum & bassline opening & the way it shifts thruout the verses. I also like the way Gontier sings in that quiet quivering voice for the 1st verse, but sings in a louder, almost hysterical way for the 2nd verse.
& lyrically, this might be 1 o’ the best songs on this album, with an actually clever pun on “letting one down” — offering to safely let someone down from somewhere dangerous playing off the opposite idea, being unable to support someone by letting them down, which bumped this song’s grade up a rank. The sarcastic way the singer sings it makes it ambiguous whether or not it’s applying this criticism to someone they trust or society in general or if it’s a self-deprecating criticism o’ their own tendency to let others down.
Grade: A
7. Now or Never
This is where the album starts to dip a bit. This isn’t a bad song: the downtuned guitars & Gontier’s singing — especially on the chorus — still sound good. But this is 1 o’ the less memorable songs, is a bit slow & hokey-sounding, & has the cringiest lyrics, with vacuous philosophizing ’bout “what does it all mean” & “¿why isn’t this word turning around?”. I dunno: ¿why should it turn around? ¿Did Lois Lane get crushed to death & does she need Superman to spin the world back in time to reverse it?
Grade: C
8. Born Like This
This song is e’en less memorable than the previous; tho it’s a bit harder & faster, there are no catchy hooks or any notable singing. & the lyrics are just baffling nonsense, especially the prechorus, proclaiming that “someone’s gun is laughing”. ¿OK? ¿Is this song ’bout school shootings? ¿Is this why the singer says in the bridge, “somewhere you’re floating high / you’re not living, we are”? ¿Is he talking ’bout someone who got shot to death? ¿& how does this relate to the following chorus lyrics?
it’s not what i gave to you it’s not what i stole we are born like this
¿Is he saying it’s not the laughing gun that’s the problem, it’s human nature?
Unfortunately, Genius has no annotation for this song, so I’ll probably ne’er know the answer to this mysterious laughing gun.
Grade: C
9. Drown
Good news: we’re back to the top-tier songs. This is 1 o’ the best songs about depression, not due to its lyrics, which are generic drivel ’bout not wanting to be controlled, — tho, to be fair, I would argue that this song’s vague incoherence, babbling ’bout how “it’s hard to fly when you can’t e’en run”, matches how many don’t really have a reason for being depressed or suicidal — but due to the absolutely dour, rainy sound o’ this song, with its sluggish bass notes mixed with soft piercing sirens in the background. The song itself sounds like it’s drowning, especially @ the end where the singer’s quickening whispering mutterings & the music become increasingly muffled.
Grade: S
10. Wake Up
A great drunken apology acoustic emo song — tho not as good as the GOAT o’ such, Blue October’s “Hate Me”. While the music supports the song, the song’s really sold by Gontier’s wavering & off-key singing, which sounds drunk & pathetic.
My 1 quibble with this song is these lines that only stood out to me now, as a much older, mature, & socially-aware adult:
i must be running out of luck ’cause you’re just not drunk enough to fuck
Um, ¿is this singer saying that he can only get sex from the recipient o’ this song ( or can only enjoy it ) when she’s too drunk to give reasoned consent? ¿Is this why she won’t “wake up” & won’t answer your knocking? Whate’er: I’m sure that’s not what the composer implied & I think back then we weren’t so conscious ’bout the iffiness o’ fucking drunk people.
Grade: A
11. Take Me Under
This song’s only problem is that it has a similar theme & sound to “Drown”, — suicidal depression — but isn’t quite as good. Which is not to say it isn’t good: I love those opening matching acoustic & bass notes, then a pause, then louder, rumbling drums & bass while the singer sings, “take me all the way”, in a voice fading as much as the singer seems to want to fade himself. That being said, the very loud chorus & e’en bridge don’t seem to mesh well with the general song’s tone. Contrast “Drown”’s chorus, which was louder than the verses, but didn’t rise to outright shouting.
Grade: B
12. Overrated
Unfortunately, this album ends with the weakest song, with pretentious but vague lyrics ’bout how the youth can’t relate to the system, man, in a voice that’s way too sinisterly cold & dour for such cheesy faux Rage Against the Machine lyrics, followed by shouting how, “¡YOUR SHIT IS OVERRATED!”. ¡Such an edgy radical!
Worse, the music is boring, with basic butt-rock-loud riffs for the opening & chorus. I guess I do kind o’ like the spooky notes under the verses, but e’ery other song on this album does better.
Grade: D
Conclusion
This album still holds up well & I won’t accept anyone who tells me otherwise. The council has made its decree.
Album Grade: A
Bonus
This isn’t part o’ this album @ all, but needs to be seen. The following is Three Days Grace performing a live cover o’ “Lose Yourself” — that’s right: the “Mom’s Spaghetti” Eminem rap song.
3. Ruins at the Bottom of the Sea Story 3: Inside the Ruins
This here is the most daring level in this game: after rolling the long way right @ the beginning, granting you a sneak preview o’ the level proper, you end up on the far right side & the goal door, right there; & unlike levels like “Go to the cellar!!”’s “Find the exit!!” & “Uncanny Mansion”’s “The way to the open door” & “Coming back is difficult”, which tease you with showing you the exit, but making you play thru the whole level to get access to it, this level doesn’t bluff & does allow you to just enter the door right @ the start. But because this game is truly about 100%-ing it, not just beating it, — if one were just beating it, ¿why would one be playing thru a bonus chapter? — the player still needs to get the treasure, & to get the treasure the player will have to play thru the level to find its door & come back to the goal later. In a way, this foreshadows Wario Land 4, but in a different way: the goal o’ that game wasn’t just to hit the switch just to go back & leave. If that were the case, then its final level would be the easiest level in the world. Its goal was to collect the various items necessary to continue thru the game & safely exit with them. This level is the earliest iteration o’ that mechanic in Wario Land, with the treasure as the collectible with which you need to escape.
Playing the level proper involves navigating a maze o’ columns, breaking thru the 1-block-high cracked spots with rolling Wario, which in some cases requires timing jumps to get from the nearest slope to the cracked wall blocking your way forward. @ a micro level, this works the same as e’ery other use o’ this mechanic in the series, but nowhere else in the series, much less this game, is it utilized in such a memorable, intricate, & thorough fashion. For instance, this level adds a few backward slopes to go backward into certain niches. & while most rolling Wario setpieces thruout the series are relatively on-the-nose ’bout how to complete them, this level’s layout is mo’ complex & has mo’ variance to the placement o’ columns, blocks, & cracked passageways & requires mo’ scrutiny to follow the right path — especially when playing the game itself & only seeing a small screen o’ the map @ a time.
Five Finger Death Punch, oft given the amazing appellation, “Five Flavor Fruit Punch”, is 1 o’ those bands that isn’t as well known to you fucking normies like Nickelback or Limp Bizkit are, but to geriatric millennials like me who still care ’bout rock music — well, a’least ’nough to make jokes ’bout it — is infamous for how popularly hated it is — so much so that I was able to find 2 separate topics to the same subreddit within the span o’ a year asking why so many people hate this band.
Now, if you’ve read the previous installments in this series, you know that I grew up loving widely-hated bands like “Disturbed in the house we’re droppin’ plates” & “I love it when you call me big” Papa Roach, & e’en had some nice things to say ’bout corny ✝-rock bands like Thousand Foot Krutch & Skillet; so you’ll be horrified when you learn that tho I did moderately enjoy radio singles like “Walk Away” &, uh… ( looks up their singles ) — o yeah, they made a cover o’ that Bad Company song, “Bad Company” — I ne’er really cared that much ’bout them & definitely didn’t get into their albums the way I did Disturbed’s Believe or Breaking Benjamin’s Phobia as a middle-school dweeb. So you can imagine what li’l eagerness I have to visit this band now.
I chose their 1st album, The Way of the Fist, ’cause… I dunno. ’Twas as good as any other album to try. ¿Is it too late to back out & try a funnier album, like St. Anger? Also, “The Way of the Fist” sounds sexual in a way, which makes me giggle like an infant.
1. Ashes
You can tell this is a HARDCORE album by the way it opens with singer Ivan Moody shouting, “¡RIGHT!”, “¡HATE!”, & “¡BRING IT!” in a way that sounds like he’s trying to hold in a burp while doing so.
If you listen to this song, you pretty much listen to almost all the songs on this album: we get arrhythmically shouted verses where Moody vaguely & tritely tells you how badass & destructive he is, followed by choruses where Moody sings ’bout the same thing, but in a mo’ morose & melodic way… ’cept Moody has such a burly voice that it doesn’t work as well as other nu-metal bands, with mechanical drumming that’s fast, but sounds both soft & thudding & squeaky guitars, all o’ which sounds saturated in fluff due to what I can only assume was terrible production or mixing. We get the expected clichés, like describing his temperament as “hair-trigger” with a “heart […] filled with ice” & calling himself a “savage beast” or a “walking 1-man genocide”, which, uh… is a weird brag to make. Committing genocide doesn’t make you tough; — nobody’s going to convince me Hitler wasn’t a bitch-ass ho — it just makes you an asshole.
If you want a much better song ’bout how e’erything the singer touches turns to shit, try this song from Stabbing Westward, the emos who made that song that went, “You can-not save me / I, can’t, even, saaaave myyyyyyyseeeeeelf / so just saaaave yooourseeeeelf”, that you probably heard on the radio a few times back then but didn’t remember ’cause ’twas just an OK song. They’re honest ’bout what bitch-ass emos they are talking ’bout breaking e’erything they touch:
Grade: D
2. The Way of the Fist
Yawn. E’en the music videos are boring. Wow, wrestling & grasping an iron fence.
Behold this Shakespearean opening:
¡break this shit down! ¡zoltan open the sky!
I thought this would be some dorky-ass pagan-myth shit till I looked up & noticed that 1 o’ their producers was apparently actually named Zoltan.
Ugh. If you don’t want to listen to this song — & you don’t want to, let me just spoil that now — but want to imagine what it sounds like, imagine getting a drumstick & just smacking a drum a bunch o’ times while shouting & maybe sorta trying to match a rhythm, but you keep forgetting what that rhythm was, so it keeps changing, but they’re all the same thumping monotony, ¿so who cares?
As for the lyrics… it’s the same shit as the last song. This is the worst time to be “reviewing” these kind o’ lyrics, too: so soon after the release o’ 4 amazing diss tracks by Kendrick Lamar, who sounds like a legit psychopath in songs like “meet the grahams”, which is for some reason in all lowercase ’cause that’s just how much he made them graham crackers shrunk, hearing generic shit like, “strapped with rage, no patience for victims” or “believe it, you need it, face-down on the fuckin’ floor” will ne’er compare to Kendrick calmly telling someone’s 7-year-ol’ son, “Adonis, I’m sorry that that man is your father…”, like Marlon Brando petting a cat.
But since it’s the 2000s, we do get lines like these:
no mercy, you faggot
O, man, we got that Hollywood-Undead-type lyricism.
Here Ivan Moody is projecting his homosexuality by calling the target of the song the homophobic slur “faggot”. This, unfortunately, is not helping Ivan’s case in proving that he isn’t gay.
This is e’en funnier, considering a line that comes later:
talk the shit, your ass is mine
Here we learn that said “five finger death punch”, as well as the “way of the fist”, is a deadly fisting.
According to Genius, “[t]he song is considered one of their heaviest songs by many fans of the band”. I mean, yeah, when all your songs are ’bout equally heavy, then all songs are tied for heaviest song by default, so this is, indeed, 1 o’ the heaviest songs.
Grade: D
3. Salvation
It’s a tragedy when you try to make your song sound all badass, but then you start your pre-chorus with “¡IT’S MONKEY SEE, YOU MONKEY DO!”.
I do give this song props for the interesting idea o’ having a solo in the middle o’ the song, ’tween the 2 verses. It’s too bad said solo is just the same stock noodly squeaky notes that e’ery Five Flamingos Doing Puns song has.
Also, this song loses points for its opening riffs sounding like a Nickelback song.
In addition to being vague like the other songs, this song is less coherent than the other songs, which, granted, makes it a bit mo’ interesting. ¿Is this 1 o’ those cliché protest songs against God & religions? ¿What does “I’m no son of your god” mean? ¿Is he insisting he’s not Jesus, famous son o’ the god o’ the most dominant religion in the west? ¿Who accused him o’ such? ¿Or is he singing from the perspective o’ Jesus in a twisted version o’ this Biblical story where Jesus rejects God’s plans for him & refuses to be prince o’er humanity? ¿& what does he mean when he ends this anti-faith chorus with the twist line, “still I find salvation”? ¿Is this a Nietzschean form o’ salvation that comes from man’s own will rather than any external deity?
Or maybe the songwriter just strung a bunch o’ generic metal words round, including vague mentions o’ religious-adjacent phrases like “faith”, “salvation”, & “son of god” without any clear idea themselves what it’s s’posed to mean in the hopes that somebody might futilely fill in the gaping blanks with their own imagination, thanks to humanity’s need to find logic in e’en the most arbitrary, & in the process may mistake this clumsy inarticulation for subtle literary mystery.
Also, the chorus is very boring &, like many songs on this album, sounds almost like whining mo’ than singing, amplified by this band’s incapability o’ rhythmic variety.
Grade: D
4. The Bleeding
This was the 1 song off this album that I recognize from the radio, &, unsurprisingly, it’s 1 o’ the least bad, since e’en the radio has some standards in terms o’ making a song sound catchy ’nough that one might want to listen to it if one were unaware that there is much better music out there. That is what the radio is for & why people who listen to the radio listens to this type o’ music: it’s already on & doesn’t let you change the song, so you just suck it up, especially since you’re probably listening to this shit be drowned out by the noise o’ heavy wind outside the open windows & screaming kids as you’re driving your minivan down an hour-long highway toward your annoying family for Thanksgiving.
For instance, ¡I can actually think o’ positives to say ’bout this song! I actually kind o’ like the justaposition o’ whate’er those melodic notes — ¿some piano? — are that plays thruout the song & the thick riffs. & this song’s verses actually have rhythm to them, with each line starting with slow syllables, building up, & hanging on the end syllables. I also like the breakdown before the bridge. Moody’s singing isn’t good, ’course, — definitely no David Draiman — but his off-key voice kind o’ works here, adding to the frail tone these lyrics are clearly going for.
Now, having said all that, the chorus is just generic shouting & the lyrics are just generic heavy metal words. I mean, the song is literally just called, “The Bleeding”; ¿can you get mo’ generic than that? We e’en have that stock phrase from 2000s butt rock, “you’re my perfect disease”, which I think originates from Nickelback’s “Figured You Out”, where Kroegerbrand sings, “You’re like my favorite damn disease”. In fact, the most damning thing I can say ’bout this song is I think that song is much better than this. That’s not a joke, I genuinely think that song is better than this. Remember, I liked the album that song was from as a kid, & while it, uh, hasn’t aged so well for me, as you can tell by my review, I was still mo’ positive toward that album than I am for this album, & that’s because I would still rather listen to that album than this.
Grade: C
5. A Place to Die
“A place to die” sounds exactly what I’ll need by the time I’m done with the following 9 songs I have to sift thru before I can stop & listen to good music again ( I’m just going to listen to “Euphoria” for the 20th time ).
Actually, this song sounds better than the previous songs — including “The Bleeding”. Then ’gain, that might just be the vodka kicking in numbing my mind. Also, since it’s the hottest part o’ summer, I have a fan blowing full blast on my face, so I’m getting that aforementioned minivan-drive-on-the-highway experience that is the only correct way to listen to Five Fans Drowning Pools. The opening notes have just the right balance o’ pattern & variation & the chorus has this kind o’ catchy “searching…”, & the singing on the bridge actually sounds pretty good, especially when Moody says, “I slowly drift apart…”. I mean, I would still rather listen to a’least 8 different Nickelback songs o’er this, but this is an improvement o’er the 1st 3 songs a’least.
Grade: C
6. The Devil’s Own
I took the trouble to look up Ivan Moody’s childhood life to make sure he wasn’t abandoned as a child, & could find no evidence o’ such, which relieves me, not just for Moody’s own well-being, but also ’cause it makes me feel better for giggling o’er how ridiculous is this melodramatic song ’bout childhood abandonment — which Genius calls “one of the darkest songs on the record” ( ¿if only “one of the darkest”, what are the other potential candidates?” ). Admittedly, it’s much funnier if you read the lyrics on a website than listen to it in its garbled, fuzzy form, so you can clearly see before your face such lyricism as, “Neglected seed, why?!” or the line “Father, bastard, I’m the Devil’s very own” prefaced with a simple, “Fuck!”, as on the Genius lyrics page.
Grade: S
7. White Knuckles
No, seriously, this cracker be just straight-up yapping thru the verses, & you have to be generous to call the choruses sung, too. & this song’s meaning is the same as half the rest o’ this album: “I’m angry; I want to punch something”. There’s just so many clichés: “sick & tired”, “demons inside command me”, “¿How many people really care?”, & “rescue the world from slavery”… Wait, ¿what? ( “always rappin’ like you ’bout to get the slaves freed” ).
These lines also stood out to me:
i won’t eat another rotten apple tho i’ve grown to like the taste
If you’ve grown to like the taste, ¿why won’t you eat them? ¿’Cause it’s bad for your health? ¿Why would you add that last line? Nobody needs to hear ’bout your masochism fetish for eating moldy food.
Needless to say, I have stopped caring ’bout how these songs sound anymo’, as they all sound the same & I’m too drunk to pay any attention to any o’ it.
Grade: D
8. Can’t Heal You
O, wow, yet another song ’bout the singer not being able to tolerate another person’s shit. ¿Who are all these assholes you keep running into? You know what they say: if e’eryone’s an asshole, then maybe you’re the asshole. You’re grown-ass men, you should be free to hang out with who you want to hang out with. Just stop hanging around assholes: there, all o’ your problems are solved.
I’m guessing by lines like, “you’re lost inside your pale addictions”, that this is ’bout some junky friend o’ the singer’s, but then near the end you get lines like, “we’re taught to perish but fade away”. ¿Are we taught to do drugs? ¿Who’s teaching us to do drugs? ¿Is this Tom MacDonald & Ben Shapiro rapping — sigh: yes, that really happened — ’bout how gangster rap teaches kids to do drugs? ¿Or is the pale addictions just some vague habits o’ self-destruction? Or maybe I shouldn’t care ’cause it’s a fucking Five Finger Death Punch song ¿WHAT AM I DOING WITH MY LIFE?
Grade: D
9. Death Before Dishonor
While this song might be 1 o’ the most banal-sounding o’ songs, lyrically it’s a bit mo’ specific ’bout what “haters, […] takers, […] liars, [& …] vultures” Moody’s ranting gainst — tho it’s an odd combination, including the FBI & cops, but also the FCC. I’m not sure what problem he has with these organizations or what it has to do with his preference for “death before dishonor” or his preference for dying o’er having to “live down on my knees”. ’Less this cracker’s cooking up meth or some hard illegal drug or engaging in some domestic terrorism shit, I don’t think the FBI’s interested in him.
But the 3 writers who worked on this poetry saved their finest work for the beginning o’ the 2nd verse:
you imitate the ostracized put your head beneath the sand
¿D’ya get it? Ostracized, ostrich.
Grade: D
10. Meet the Monster
This song, whose title oozes with cheese, starts with a decent downtuned rhythm, only to explode into this album’s typical wall of o’erproduced noise. The chorus singing sounds particularly warped: ¿a goofy effect or the outcome o’ too much compression? I’m not an audio engineer, so I don’t know.
The lyrics are particularly odd — & by odd, I mean awkward, starting with the eloquent, “it’s not that complicated & you ain’t gotta believe”, & following with lines that don’t e’en feel like they belong together. In fact, “they’ll put me down in a hole before I let you succeed” contradicts “I know you think you’re special, but you ain’t nothin’” 2 lines later: if the person you’re talking to is nothing special, ¿why are you so willing to prevent this person from succeeding? Sounds quite important to you to me.
¿can you read between the lines? ¿or are you stuck in black & white?
¿Why would there be color ’tween 2 black-&-white lines? If the lines are black & white, — if the text is black & the document white — that implies the whole document is black & white, so ’tween them would also be black & white. ’Gain: these lines have nothing to do with each other. I guess I can’t read ’tween the lines, as there must be some hidden line that would connect these 2.
hope I’m on the list of people that you hate
This is just a metaphor that has no connection to reality by itself: nobody creates a list o’ people that they hate but Richard Nixon, & he died several years before this song came out.
it’s time you met the monster that you have helped create
this menacing line is followed by the weakest “bleh” sound, to really rub in how scary it’s s’posed to be.
I’m sick of all of the fiction; we’re gonna settle it
¿Are we? ’Cause I have a subtle hunch that I’m gonna hear ’bout how much you hate this unknown honkey for 3 mo’ songs.
Grade: D
Final Thoughts
Actually, the good news is we don’t have to: those other 3 songs are bonus tracks, including an acoustic version o’ “The Bleeding”, which was definitely warranted from a band like this. Yeah, “Never Enough” was a single that they for some reason didn’t include on the original release o’ this album but did on re-releases as a bonus track & offered for free on their website to those who bought the original version o’ this album s’posedly. It’s all right: it’s much catchier than e’ery song on this list. But the lyrics are ultra vague, e’en by this album’s standards: other than the weird metaphor ’bout people being chalk drawings on the concrete, this song is full o’ “it’s never enough”s, “it’s all fucked”s, & literal, “‘say this’, ‘say that’”s, as if a meta commentary on how bland the lyrics are. If we include that song, it’s the best on this album, but still just a C, & that says something.
Final Grade: D
I’m sorry we went back to back with meh albums. That’s the problem when you try to be mo’ authentic than all the memesters online who just look @ infamously bathic nu-metal bands like Limp Bizkit or “Staind boxer shorts”: turns out most o’ those ol’ 2000s nu-metal & alt-metal bands are mo’ just boring & repetitive than hilariously terrible. This also explains why despite Five Flummoxed Brady Bunches being so widely hated online, they’re not as infamous: they’re not as fun to hate on.
I swear after this we will look @ a much mo’ interesting album — well, to me a’least.
The most interesting swimming level in this game, especially with the unique mechanic o’ the eels you have to dodge by quickly swimming in front o’ them & swimming back ’way, & then rushing past them as they pull back. Granted, I’m mixed on the treasure door’s hiding place under the last eel, requiring you to intentionally get grabbed by it down to the small pocket o’ clear water that holds it: on 1 hand, it’s certainly 1 o’ the most memorable treasure door locations; on the other, it’s a bit unfair & counterintuitive to expect the player to intentionally let themself get hit by something the game heavily discourages you from getting hit by, especially when you lose 2 coins whene’er you’re grabbed, e’en by the eel you’re s’posed to be grabbed by.
While not quite unique, the seagull platforms introduced in this level are also a rare mechanic that helps this level stand out, tho they don’t contribute much to this level beyond acting as stepping stones to collecting coins & can be completely ignored for just going from start to level goal.
The central mechanic o’ falling rocks o’ randomly varying sizes — small rocks, which can be grabbed & thrown, & large boulders that make Wario flat — is unique & clever. Unfortunately, going to the other extreme o’ this game’s most common problem to the greatest extent in this game, this level relies almost entirely on this gimmick thruout the whole level, with the only exceptions being a room with basic enemies & a basic room where you break blocks as fat Wario.
While I’m thankful that there are only 2 places where you’d want to be flat Wario, both just for coins, that leaves catching small rocks & dodging large boulders, usually just so you can throw the small rocks @ throw blocks in the way o’ coins, to hold up this whole level. A bit o’ variety would’ve gone a long way. They do add minor complications like needing to jump o’er gaps while dodging boulders & specially bats who not only risk grabbing you & making you drop the rock you’re holding, but can also make you drop your rock if you jump into it to try avoid being grabbed.
