The Scrounger's Report

Dec. 01, 2001

The Blasphemous Mini Scrounger's Report

So I was out cruising the local Christian bookstores in search of an 
innocent young virgin to sacrifice at our monthly Heavy Metal meeting 
(actually, I was trying to find the Charlie Daniels single "It's Not a Rag 
It's a Flag" which for some reason I cannot find *ANYWHERE* locally; if 
someone can hook me up, please email me offlist), so I took the opportunity 
to listen to some of the new/recent Christian releases out there. One of 
the nice things about the Berean Bookstore chain (not sure if it's national 
or regional) is that they have Muze-like listening stations that are really 
cool as hell [sic]:

15-inch color touchscreen with an attached barcode scanner. You wave the CD 
you want to preview in front of the scanner and it brings up the 
information on the CD: cover art, year/label information, track listing, 
artist discography, and you can choose which tracks you want to listen to. 
If the scanner doesn't reconcile the barcode with a disc in its database, 
you can type in the first few letters of the artist name and/or browse 
through the database. It's really, really cool.

At any rate, I listened to Petra's new album "Revival"... 
*BAZOOKABARF!!!!!* This is horrendous. Absolutely awful. I'm thinking that 
a certain deity might look down from on high and smite them just on 
principle. It really is *that* bad. It's hard to believe this is the same 
band that released the gems "Beyond Belief" and "Unseen Power". There is no 
resemblence at all to the Petra of Old.. The downward spiral that started 
with "No Doubt", and accelerated rapidly with "God Fixation", has plummeted 
deep into the bowels of hell with this release. Avoid at all costs!

The trip wasn't all bad. I did pick up a few keepers:

Saviour Machine - Legend Part III:1. 2001. MCM Music (Diamante).
These guys are an acquired taste. Melodic Christian goth is probably 
the best way to describe them. Dark... moody... just what one would expect.

Salt - Satisfied. 2001. Mercy Street Records.
I never heard of these guys before, and had I not been able to preview 
the disc on the Muze (no clue what I should call that system...) I never 
would have picked it up. It's Christian AOR/hard rock that's very melodic. 
Nothing very innovative, but solidly performed.

4 Him - Walk On. 2001. Word Entertainment.
I've been majorly disappointed with their recent studio efforts (IMHO, 
the last good album they did was "The Ride" in 1994), so when I saw this at 
Berean i was kinda "ho hum" about it, but figured I owed it at least a 
listen. Hey, not bad!! They've "unwimped" (for lack of a better term). 
While not fully back to the glory of their heyday in the early 1990s, the 
choruses on this are a *MAJOR* improvement from their recent material. As 
Christian AOR goes, 4 Him has had some *extremely* memorable choruses (my 
favorites are "When It's Time to Go" and the title cut from "The Basics of 
Life", as well as "For Future Generations" and the title cut from "The 
Ride"), and this new album has a fair amount of staying potential.

and lastly, courtesy of the local Best Buy:

Tuff - The History of Tuff. 2001. RLS Records.
Probably old news for fans, but for those who haven't heard it, it's 
*well* worth getting! It's a greatest hits compilation with some new 
tracks, and the track lineup differs from "Decade of Disrespect", their 
previous GH compilation. The primary reason to get the album is the 
complete and utter parody it does of Kid Rock and "American Badass" (which 
I happen to love, as a matter of fact). The opening cut on this album 
"American Hair Band" had me rolling on the floor! It's worth the price of 
the album alone. It's *that* good. Tracks 2-4, recorded in 2000 are also 
extremely solid. Since it's "nice priced" at $12.99 it's definitely worth 
snagging!

That's all for now. Time to go repent.... or not.

-Dan