Hollywood Undead - Swan Songs CD Review (A&M/Octone) ~ BrooklynRocks: NYC Music Blog

Saturday, February 14, 2009

Hollywood Undead - Swan Songs CD Review (A&M/Octone)

Hollywood Undead CD ReviewHollywood Underground is the "poster child" for all the bands that hope to be discovered on MySpace. The band's Wikipedia bio says that "in their first nine weeks on MySpace they had almost a million plays". Currently, Hollywood Undead's MySpace player has more than 76 million plays. As the band played their first live show only last year, these stats are insanely impressive when compared against Metallica's 42 million plays or Linkin Park's 82 million plays.

Musically, Hollywood Underground is a rap-metal band that comes across like a cross between 2 Live Crew and Linkin Park. The band features six masked MCs who trade off lyrics about sex (and more sex), drugs, broken romance and the darker side of Hollywood. It is a good thing that these guys are getting MySpace play as the majority of the band's lyrics would cause an FCC censor to blush.

Below is the video for "No. 5", which is a pretty good representation of the band's sound and the rest of the songs on this disc.


While you will notice immediately that the band's lyrics aren't deep and meaningful (No. 5- "when you're drunk, shake that ass like you know how to dance" or Everywhere I Go - "Everywhere I go, b*tches always know, the Charlie Scene has a weenie that he likes to show"), I can easily envision a young crowd memorizing and singing along with every word.

While I'm definitely out of the age demographic that this disc is targeted to, the band's catchy hooks have some staying power. I don't think there is anyone in my age group who wouldn't still recognize 2 Live Crew's "Me So Horny" now twenty years after its release. There are some songs on Swan Songs that could easily achieve this sort of recognition and notoriety.

Hollywood Undead are currently off on the Saints & Sinners tour with Senses Fail and Haste the Day. Area tour stops are:
March 7, 2009 6:00PM - Crazy Donkey, Farmingdale, New York
March 8, 2009 6:00PM - Webster Theatre, Hartford, Connecticut
March 10, 2009 6:00PM - Filmore at Irving Plaza

Links:
Hollywood Undead's MySpace Profile