Syracuse Ska Forum

It makes me so happy that our album could inspire this much of any kind of emotion in a reviewer. hahahaha

"Marx Revolution – “Spaceship KnifeFight” - What a f*ck waste of time and energy. This band reminds me of No Use for a Name inbred with some crappy ska band and the singer of Amber Pacific. There’s the late 90’s 3rd generation oversaturated NUFAN guitar sound, with horns, and a singer who is trying WAY too hard to sing the lyrics. I guess the biggest problem I have with this album (besides the singer’s vocal style) is the lack of escaping repetition in their sound. The songs, particularly in the latter half, start to drag together and are not distinct enough to differentiate themselves from one another. The times when they venture out from their typical sound is when they excel, but they don't do it very often. It’s safe to say that I didn’t enjoy this album and would recommend passing this by, even when you see it in the 3 for $8 bargain bin at your local record store. It’s that bad."

- Jonny Taint of http://www.punkrockreview.org


"This album blasts out of the gate with a short but aggro song called “Aderol” that is total metal, which caught me by surprise, even though the band describes themselves as “…essentially a ska band with very heavy punk and metal influence.” From there, the album slides into a more extreme ska-core sound, featuring songs that are very fast and very punk/metal, with only brief infusions of ska guitar, and sprinklings of horn lines throughout.

According to alto sax player Aaron, the album was self-recorded at a studio on the campus of the University of New Haven. While I do commend the band for taking on such a project themselves, I would suggest that they re-visit some of the tracks, and possibly get some outside help re-mixing it. On many of the songs, I get the feeling that the overall “listenability” would be helped by tweaking the mix. This can make a big difference between having an album that grows weary after a couple of listens, and an album that you will want to listen to over and over again. In addition, the horns often sound out of tune. Playing horns on top of this style of music is a challenge, but you have to start with good tuning or it just sounds sloppy.

The guitar work is strongest when the band is playing its heavier, chunkier stuff, and the guitar, bass and drums do sound fairly tight together.

A bright spot on the album is the title track, which is a slower, reggae song featuring a flange-heavy guitar.

Overall, not a horrible effort considering its a first album and entirely DIY, but the album suffers from some awkwardness brought on both by the production value, and possibly from a group of musicians that is still working to find its true sound."

- http://www.skasource.com

The SkaSource review was admittedly fairly spot-on, and definitely a tad more credible, but the PunkRockReview review did give me a good laugh. If anybody would like to do another review of our CD please contact me!

Not to steal your thunder, especially since that first review is awesome- but it reminded me of this sweet review we got in Razorcake for the Fleeced EP:

When this first came on the stereo I thought: awesome. Angry, modernized Born Against style hardcore. I was so into it. And then it changed. My trembling finger rose slowly to the speakers. There it was. The ska. Suddenly, I was assaulted by ghastly saxophones and Sublime-esque ska. Why this inexplicable shift, I’ve no idea. But it’s a bad idea. Please, for the love of god, fire the saxophone player, kick the eternal upstroke out of the guitar player, and just play the hardcore. There is great potential in that. But with the ska, oh no. No, no, no. –KO! (http://www.pocketfulofchangerecords.com)

LOL. win.

The idea that you guys sounded anything like Sublime is hilarious