{"id":362,"date":"2003-06-17T00:30:06","date_gmt":"2003-06-17T05:30:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/skateandannoy.com\/reviews\/?p=362"},"modified":"2013-12-26T17:52:25","modified_gmt":"2013-12-26T17:52:25","slug":"the-automatics-murder-suicide","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/skateandannoy.com\/reviews\/music\/2003\/06\/the-automatics-murder-suicide\/","title":{"rendered":"The Automatics: Murder Suicide"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"The<\/a><\/p>\n

The Automatics: Murder Suicide
\nLabel: Just Add Water
\nRelease Date: 2000
\nReview Date: 2003<\/p>\n

These would-be punk rock nerds get points taken off immediately for not doing their homework and taking the same name as an elder and semi-famous UK punk band from the seventies. Can you get past that? If so, then read on.<\/p>\n

On first listen, this record is totally disposable, except for a couple of catchy tunes. On second listen the catchy tunes are already in your head a little bit, and some of the more mediocre tunes stand out a bit more. Subsequent listens will not get you much more than that. There are a couple of pure pop-punk ditties in here that can easily earn a place on any mix-tape. Ok, mix-CD. Does anyone still have tapes? Mix-CD just doesn\u2019t flow off the tongue though.<\/p>\n

Getting back to the Automatics, The title track, “Murder Suicide” is easily the strongest track on the CD. It\u2019s darn good too. Another good one, “Good Things” is reminiscent of Descendents from days of yore. “This Unit” reminds me a bit of one of my new favorite bands, the Selby Tigers. I know it\u2019s not possible that they\u2019ve influenced the Automatics, but it\u2019s nice to find kindred spirits. That, and robot songs are, for the most part, always fun. So take the good songs and the songs that are enjoyable, but not memorable, and you\u2019ve got a something you can listen to on the odd occasion. I say “odd” occasion because there are a couple of rather clumsy attempts that are somewhat annoying and sophomoric. “Stuck in Traffic” is pretty good at getting it\u2019s point across, but probably not in the manner it was intended.<\/p>\n

Murder Suicide is not a great record. It\u2019s fairly mediocre, but it\u2019s bright spots are pretty good. If you are the type with a lot of extra cash and don\u2019t mind buying a CD for a couple of tracks, then send your money to me and download those tracks off this months version of Napster. I would imagine that these guys do their best to put on a good live show. Nerds are some of the best punkers.<\/p>\n

Just Add Water Records P.O. Box 420661 San Francisco, Ca 94142<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Automatics: Murder Suicide Label: Just Add Water Release Date: 2000 Review Date: 2003 These would-be punk rock nerds get points taken off immediately for not doing their homework and taking the same name as an elder and semi-famous UK punk band from the seventies. Can you get past that? If so, then read on. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1452,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[206536,206537,206533],"class_list":["post-362","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-music","tag-automatics","tag-just-add-water-records","tag-punk"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/skateandannoy.com\/reviews\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/3\/2003\/06\/automatics-murder-suicide.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/skateandannoy.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/362","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/skateandannoy.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/skateandannoy.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/skateandannoy.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/skateandannoy.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=362"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/skateandannoy.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/362\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/skateandannoy.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1452"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/skateandannoy.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=362"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/skateandannoy.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=362"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/skateandannoy.com\/reviews\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=362"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}