Hinder: All American Nightmare

When a band’s song titles can make a reasonably funny exchange you know you’re in for a fun time. “Hey ho, everybody’s wrong, what you gonna do; put that record on?” That phrase is indicative of everything that you will find on this album. Sleazy might be a good word for it. This definitely isn’t something you would play for your mother, unless y’know she’s a Hinder fan, but if that were the case you would have bigger problems to deal with.

This is Oklahoma-grown hard rock with enough ballads to make chuck Norris cry. About half of the songs on this album are packed with enough drug references to alert the DEA, and the other half are semi-coherent attempts at reflection.

I actually like the sleaze; I wish they would only play sleazy rock songs. When these guys rock they do it right. Songs like “Waking Up The Devil,” or “Strip Tease” have a sinister vibe to them, there’s even a solo in one of them. The problem with this music is the amount of ballads. One or two ballads on a rock album are excusable. This one has three, and only one of them is good. If they cut the other two ballads and left “The Life,” they would have room for some more real rock. All in all, it’s a solid effort but it could be so much more.

In A Word: Inconsistent