Hey, Zeus On Heroin

http://zerocoolband.com

Let me tell you about this experience I had in a strange dream. It was a hot summer day in a suburb I’ve probably never visited in real life. I was at the top of a street, slanted downhill. It was midday. I found myself in a streetluge - which is nothing like luging in the winter. It’s a lot like skateboarding only…with your body laying flat on the board – going down this street so fast my eyes couldn’t see anything, the lines all blurring into undistinguishable shapes and masses. The fear of hitting something and my body launching far into the air was only eclipsed by the fear of suddenly stopping in a dead halt with none of the answers to my questions realized.

Why was I not skateboarding? Why was I not thinking of other things I could have been doing? What was so special about going down that hill like road on a board? The only suitable answer I could come up with apart from the retort that it was a dream and I can dream whatever my subconscious demands me to is that I was seeking some sort of subconscious mental assault, an idea that sounds pretty bogus anyway.

Yet, listening to Zero Cool’s most recent album “Hey, Zeus on Heroin” is the equivalent of strapping yourself in and careening down a street at speeds you’ll do best to avoid reaching in any other situation, unless you’re a speed junkie in which case is a totally cool decision. Once the tense apocalyptic introduction to “Square Pusher” ends, the album rushes at a breakneck pace, stopping for no one. It’s rooted in late 80s, early 90s skate/thrash punk with a lyrical focus on all the wrong things, samples of speeches from dudes like MLK or the guy on ‘We’re All Going to Hell’ proclaiming the rock and roll lifestyle to be strange don’t seem out of place in the Zero Cool universe.

Having the ability to play faster than everyone else is something a lot of punk bands strive for but what makes the songs on “Hey, Zeus…” interesting is the brevity and the amount of dynamics present. It helps that the album’s production avoids the thin, trebly production most punk rock albums seem to suffer from and beefs the guitars and drums, resulting in an album that never wavers from its mission statement in delivering a high quality sound barrage that both entertains and provokes.

- Jibrill Yasin

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