Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating * * * *

Nature doesn’t just abhor a vacuum, it sends it hate mail on a regular basis, it throws out invitations to it asking if it’s feeling lucky enough to be reckoned with over six rounds and finally takes the arrogant void round the back of the local pub for a friendly word down its empty headed shell like ear. Nature, the one wearing the white Stetson but whose own moral values are that which are vague as to which way in wants the outcome to fall, is determined that the vacuum should be consumed and an alternative sought. Whether in politics, music or in any other spectrum of Human activity, a vacuum is a dangerous entity in which to be stood next to.

The vacuum is placed as music evidence as Agnostic Front release their latest punk/Thrash hybrid album before the fans and put forward the interesting proposition that The American Dream Died, possibly when there was no perceived bad guy in which to sell the ideological stand point to. The vacuum becomes the master in such cases and as with all Empires, creaks start to be seen when the perceived viewpoint of the enemy is vanquished.

The American Dream Died might be an outlandish statement to make and be full of wonder to many, especially this side of the Atlantic Ocean. Yet as the hard crunching, metal twisting hardcore grind and Punk sentiment abounds, it’s hard not read the lyrics, to take in the sound of people actually voicing their resentment to the bankers and so called powers that be and not feel sympathy for their plight.

Agnostic Front have captured a growing mood that has had enough of the singular aspect of corruption that not only stinks in many quarters, the smell is infectious, it carries with it the burden carried by the all who sit beneath the vacuum’s blank stare. Punk attitudes may seem an expression of choice to far in some quarters, but as songs such as Never Walk Alone, Enough is Enough, No War F**k You, the blistering Old New York and Police Violence fill the air, it is an attitude that serves well, for it hangs with its own brand of honesty, its own sincerity intact, for when you’re at the bottom kicking up, sincerity is all you have to be armed with.

The American Dream Died arguably on the day when there was no more opposition in which to hold up as an example of what the choices were, one ideological standpoint wearing the white Stetson of truth, a Stetson many might argue only glimmered white because of the amount of Hollywood lights shining down on it.

Blistering, attacking and powerful, Agnostic Front have delivered their own damning verdict upon The American Dream.

Ian D. Hall