### The Exploited: Beat the bastards

#### 23/06/09 || Daemonomania

What’s speedier than a desert prison bound meth-head, more left-wing than Ted Nugent, and crustier than your underwear after a Mexican food binge? If you guessed your mom, you are probably correct. But Alex Trebek will also accept who are The Exploited.

Here’s the summary: Exodus with Johnny Rotten’s drunk and pissed Scottish cousin on vocals. Interested? Then adjust your monocle, make a harumpf noise, and scan on, dear reader.

Yes indeed, this is a fine slab of sweet crossover (yeah I know the strict definition of crossover probably doesn’t apply) from 1996 – hard to believe that was over ten years ago, right? The band themselves have been around since 1979, which must make for some droopy wrinkly Mohawks these days. Fuck, they’re lucky to still have any follicular integrity at all. Imagine how embarrassing it must be to have a giant multicolored hairdo then realize you’re balding in the back? Its enough to make you start wholeheartedly embracing rampant consumerism.

Anyway, take the basic musical template of “Tempo of the damned”, speed it up a bit, and add some more not-too-deep political lyrics and you’ve got “Beat the bastards”. Nice, grooving speed/thrash with plenty of memorable choruses and a spiffy production job. This disc is quite close to me as it is one of the first I enjoyed as a budding metalhead who still nursed an unhealthy affinity for punk. The two meld quite well on “Beat the bastards”, like if someone melted down the various evil Terminators and threw in a small piece of Lenin’s preserved brain. The resulting Commie machine might make even Obayma shit his pants.

I can highly recommend the title track (guess what the chorus is?), the bass heavy and totally rocking “Don’t blame me”, the ever-so-true fact that there’s a “Law for the rich” and a law for the people like you and me, the groovyasshit “System fucked up”, and the meanspirited “Serial Killer (sample lyric – child cries, pedophile fuck you). All around this is a great motivator to get out your aggression at the soon-to-be-canceled ruling class over a pint of bitter. On a side note, I’ll bet these would be some fun fucken dudes to knock back a couple lukewarm beers and embrace the working class ethos with on a Saturday night.

Too bad their next album was a total and complete shit retread of what the Scots achieved here. Seriously horrendous. So enjoy the band whilst they were in their prime.

A bourgeois 8.5 out of 10 for these ancient sacks of haggis in 1996 at least.

- Information
- Released: 1996
- Label: Music For Nations
- Website: www.the-exploited.net
- Band
- Wattie: vocals
- Jamie Buchan: guitar
- Jim Gray: bass
- William Buchan: drums, bass

- Tracklist
- 01. Beat the Bastards
- 02. Affected by Them
- 03. Don’t Blame Me
- 04. Law For the Rich
- 05. System Fucked Up
- 06. They Lie
- 07. If You’re Sad
- 08. Fightback
- 09. Massacre of Innocents
- 10. Police TV
- 11. Sea of Blood
- 12. 15 Years
- 13. Serial Killer