Album Review: Coaster by NOFX

After 25 years in the game, NOFX are still going and are still as bratty as ever, sneering as they tackle their favorite subjects: drinking ("The Quitter," "I Am an Alcoholic," "First Call"), anti-religion ("Best God in Show," "Blasphemy [The Victimless Crime]"), and anti-patriotism ("We Called It America," "Suits and Ladders"). Nothing new there, but along with well-trodden themes of partying, agnosticism, and clever observations about their scene, there's a big departure this time around that comes in the form of "My Orphan Year. " Fat Mike is at his most confessional in a rare, sincere, Barbara Walters moment, wherein he opens up his journal to the dark days with remorseful lyrics about the death of his parents.

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If you expected the new NOFX album to sound any different from the last 10 NOFX studio albums, you've stage-dived onto your head too often. Fat Mike isn't interested in experimenting with the band's sound patent, especially this late in the game. [rssbreak] His lyrics, though, are getting better with time. There's self-deprecating humour about using their CDs as coasters, unabashed Christian-baiting on Best God In Show and alarmingly large numbers of substance-abuse admissions on First Call and I Am An Alcoholic.

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The liner notes of Coaster mention that NOFX have been around for 25 years, and that’s an impressive accomplishment. But the last couple of releases the band have put out have been lackluster. 2003 brought the heavy-handed, Bush-bashing War On Errorism. 2006 gave us the lazy, phoned-in Wolves in Wolves’ Clothing, which announced itself as such by calling the first track “60%”, and singing about how they got by by half-assing it.

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