Alkaline Trio: Agony and Irony 0
A darker & more polished offering from an underground favorite
By Jeremy Azevedo
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Alkaline Trio has always been known for combining gothic melodrama with hard-driving punk, a combination that has long pleased the elitist music underground. On their new album, “Agony and Irony”, Alkaline Trio has tipped the scales a little bit further into Smiths territory than their more hardcore punk fans will probably appreciate. |
It’s probably a smart decision though, because crust punks aren’t exactly known to purchase a lot of albums, and Alkaline Trio has greater expectations to live up to now that they’re on Epic records, with Josh Abraham (Slayer, Linkin Park, Atreyu, Pink, etc.) producing.
So… Agony and Irony is not a particularly upbeat album, but I’ll be goddamned if it isn’t catchy as hell anyway. Not since The Cure has a band been so adept at making such miserable subject matter sound so poppy. Most of the songs here are real finger-snappers, despite being all about sadness and death. It’s like Alkaline Trio is the evil twin of one of those corny pop punk bands like Angels and Airwaves or whatever band those vapid dorks from Blink 182 are in these days.
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