culture
Sound Advice: Why Do You Hate Me? by Shit From Hell
Local punk band fronted by Liberal Party super-spin doctor is still listenable once the novelty wears off.
On the surface, Toronto-based punkers Shit From Hell are an enjoyable, if slightly silly and derivative punk rock band.
In fact, in many ways, Shit From Hell’s latest release, Why Do You Hate Me?, is a fairly typical pop-punk record. It has two songs about how much Facebook sucks (“Modern Age” and “Super Poke”), a pointedly inflammatory sacrilegious track (“Jesus Got Wood”), and a song about MILFs (“Horny Single Mom.”) If you were judging Shit From Hell on their musical merits alone, you’d probably dub them to be a solid outfit who differ from their peers in three key ways: their lyrics are funnier than average; their version of pop-punk owes less to turn-of-the-millennium superstars like Blink-182 and Face to Face and more to late ’70s and early ’80s OGs like the Buzzcocks and The Undertones; and they are, on average, about 25 years older than the average local pop-punk act.
All that being said, it’s fairly safe to assume that almost no one listening to Why Do You Hate Me? is doing so for strictly musical reasons. They’re listening because the band of middle-aged miscreants are lead by none other than Liberal Party spin doctor extrordinaire Warren Kinsella.
Hearing a Liberal strategist play punk rock is sort of like watching a trained bear ride a tricycle; it’s weird and unnatural, but you can’t help but pay attention.
Kinsella isn’t just what draws listeners to Why Do You Hate Me?, it’s also the reason the album is so much fun. His delivery is snotty in the best, most genre-appropriate way possible, and his lyrics on songs like “The Truth” (which you can listen to by clicking the sample above) are surprisingly well thought out.
If you’re listening to Why Do You Hate Me?, you’re almost certainly doing so for the sheer novelty of hearing punk as interpreted by a political spin doctor. That’s fine, but don’t be surprised when you wind up liking it more than you wanted to.