Regurgitator
Tu-Plang (Reprise)
by Lex Marburger
Wow! What a cool compilation! It’s got indie rock, funk-punk, rap, all sorts of stuff!
What? It’s all one band?
No way. What, they wanted to start their album with “I Sucked A Lot Of Cock To Get Where I Am,” and then follow it with a 311 style tune? Yeah, “Kung Foo Sing,” all right. And I suppose you’re telling me that they did “G7 Dick Electro Boogie,” too. Not with that heavy duty Beastie hip hop. I suppose you’ll be telling me next that “Couldn’t Do It (Happy Shopper Mix)” with the G. Love/Fun Lovin’ Criminals vibe is the same band too, huh? Gimme those liner notes. Oh. I see.
Well, it’s true. Regurgitator plays all the songs on Tu-Plang,though I don’t really know how. No, that’s not quite right. I don’t know why. The album keeps going, with “Miffy’s Simplicity” sounding like a crossover metal/pop punk tune, and then with some sort of White Zombie riff that goes into a modified Chili Peppers groove on “Social Disaster.” It’s like an album of channel surfing. “Music Is Sport” comes close to a Dr. Dre outtake (I said close, mind you), and that’s immediately followed by a Ventures rip off, “348 Hz.” From there it goes into the grunge of “Mañana,” followed by some hardcore via “F.S.O.” “Pop Porn” gets a slight Cypress Hill feel (with some old school Ice T dirty raps), while “Young Bodies Heal Quickly” shoots for Fugazi-ish post-punk. “Blubber Boy (Riding the Wave of Fashion Mix)” reprises the indie rock feel from the first tune. They close with a deep dub called “Doorselfin,” which sounds like something Laswell considered but later rejected.
To sum up: Tu-Plang is a veritable catalog of contemporary “Alternative” musical styles, all played by the same band. There’s no consistency between the tunes, and although each one is performed competently, there’s no sense of unity. Too diverse? Possibly. It seems there’s not enough of blending between the songs themselves. They seem walled off from each other. It’s as if Regurgitator said “Okay, we’ll write the grunge tune here, the rap tune here, and then we’ll write an indie rock tune,” without bleeding the styles together. Regurgitator is from Australia, and although they say it’s a melting pot, it seems like there’s a lot of chunks left over.