Article by Social E
Warped Tour Photos by Jenifer Hanen

NOFX / Rancid, BYO Records Split Series, Volume III (BYO Records)

Cover songs have always been an interesting musical phenomenon. In the purest sense, they provide a way for a band to pay homage to peers and influences, and, on occasion display a sense of individuality and experimentation when a group takes a cover in a completely different direction than the original. Bay area punkers Rancid and NOFX have teamed up to deliver a split record covering a selection of each other's songs for the third edition of BYO Record's popular Split Series. While fans of either group will undoubtedly gobble up this release, for an album of cover songs, the record ultimately displays little ingenuity.

NOFX opens the album, covering six Rancid selections from four of the group's releases. NOFX's vocalist, Fat Mike, takes each of these numbers for his own with his distinctive voice that sounds akin to a punk rock Gilbert Godfrey. Unfortunately the vocals are about all that is distinctive on much of this half of the record. Tracks like "Olympia, WA" and "Tenderloin" and receive pretty straight-forward musical treatments, as does "Corazon de Oro." The real gem of the NOFX side, and of the whole record, has to be a reggae version of Rancid's "Radio," from the group's Let's Go album. If only more numbers were done like this. NOFX has done the traditional reggae trip many times, and they do it wonderfully with this selection, with El Jeffe taking over vocal duties.

The album, sadly, slips from there with Rancid taking over to cover half a dozen NOFX tracks. As opposed to Fat Mike, who enunciates his words with an almost sarcastic whine, Rancid's Tim Armstrong slurs and garbles his way though the opening cut, "Moron Brothers." Armstrong is an unusual, and oftenformidable vocalist, using a slurred vocal style, combined with some interesting rhyme delivery, to help craft a unique style for his band. However, for a band as talented as Rancid, one was hoping for some interesting treatments of NOFX material. What one gets are some obvious choices that at times make one just wish for the originals. "Don't Call Me White" gets vocalized by Rancid bassman Matt Freeman. And while NOFX's original stung with a sarcastic tirade on reverse racism, the cover has all subtly smashed like an 800 pound gorilla with the sheer abrasive, gutteral chunk of Freeman's voice. A great bass player he definitely is; a vocalist he definitely is not.

Likewise, "Brews," originally an interesting number about Jewish skinheads get redone to now only merely sound like filler on a Rancid record. The record ends with "Vanilla Sex," a scathing look at the invasion of privacy in America. Rancid's version is probably the best of all it's offerings on this album, but ultimately, it too is so straight forward in it's delivery that vanilla becomes an adept adjective to describe this portion of the album.