| "What is wrong with the world today?" bellows frontman Coby Dick on Infest, Papa Roach's opening statement of intent. "The government, the media, or your family?" Welcome to the post-Millennial American rockscape, where every teen has his cross to bear and every band approaches the recording of an album with a whole head of demons to exorcise. And welcome, Papa Roach--not a band that comes to lay waste, more a band that studies the emotionally devastated fall-out once everything's been wasted. Infest is an album very much in the mould of Limp Bizkit's Significant Other--muscular, bruising rap-metal, dysfunctional two-fingers-to-the-world attitude--but where Limp Bizkit's anger manifests in Fred Durst's crotch-clutching braggadio, Papa Roach wear their issues with a sense of empathy. The likes of "Revenge" and "Broken Home" ("I know my mother loves me/ But does my father even care?") are pretty self-explanatory, but on "Last Resort"--a brutally simplistic study of a friend's suicide attempt--Papa Roach's brevity is their undeniable strength. Tell the parents--here's a rock band of positive male role-models, ready to bang the world to rights. --Louis Pattison |
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