Teenage Bottlerocket Lets Its Freak Flag Fly

If punk rock is essentially short bursts of rebellious fury then Laramie, Wyoming's Teenage Bottlerocket has done its homework. The new "Freak Out" CD never lags in the energy department. Just examine the steroid blitz that is "Who Killed Sensei" and you'll get my point. "Summertime" is awash in warm chord shiftings that demand this be played with a white sand beach backdrop. "Done With Love" successfully hammers home one man's being too busy to indulge a minor trifle such as the whole love and be loved game. Credit vocalist Ray Carlisle's snarling defiance for allowing him to fit into the shoes of sympathetic victim."Radical" is an amusing little composition based on its use of soundalike words such as fanatical and hypothetical. The rhythms are solid due in no small measure to Brandon Carlisle who gamely keeps pace with Kody Templeman as he races up and down the fretboard. As is common with punk albums many of these tracks are astonishingly short. The lyrics can come off as puerile but that too isn't foreign to punk where attitude rules the day. "Freak Out" may not offer any Mensa scholar musings but can at least be used as a primer for neophytes stumbling through the punk world trying to grasp the genre's essence.