Album Review- The Alarm- WAR

The Alarm came up in discussion on a vinyl group and I felt I was being clever when I said they occupied the space metaphorically and literally between London Calling and The Joshua Tree. This will sound like feint praise, but every band (particularly those with a political bent) falls under the shadows of those titans. To the Alarm’s credit, they had a strong run of singles, and it’s quite possible that songs like “The Stand” sound even better today. The heyday of The Alarm ended with one of their most accessible singles “Sold Me Down The River”. In the days where college rock was dominated by a certain Joshua Tree-era U2/REM influenced anthemic Americana rock, this new Alarm sound likely should have taken over the airwaves, but only lent bands like the Alarm, the Call, and the Smithereens a dedicated cult following. The Alarm never really went away as Mike Peters seemingly took a break in the mid -90s but hasn’t rested much since. As someone who writes criticism of music, WAR is hard to hate. It is quite obvious intended as an album for the fans. For those who preordered, the Alarm mailed out blank CDRs so people could download the songs as soon as they were completed The album was started in January 7 and released on February 25. So it’s a very quick, very topical record. Personally, I think that is quite risky. Even with a talented artist such as Neil Young dropping his “Living With War”- you have those risks. So, it’s really hard to criticize this album, which is dedicated for the diehards. Pitchfork isn’t going to spend much time on a 40 year old band and it’s not like I’m not going to drop “Rain in the Summertime” on the occasional playlist. I will just stick with saying this one isn’t going to be an album I am likely to revisit. The lyrics already sound a bit dated (“2020 problems”) and the bands shout out loud anthems seem closer to Bon Jovi than anything that was played on 120 Minutes. Still, albums like this are always nice to see musical talent still kicking and another classic Alarm single could still show up around the corner.