Review Summary: Mainstream rock band Hinder produces an utter pile of crap with their debut album, 'Extreme Behavior'. Even fans of Nickelback and Buckcherry should beware, for Hinder only sounds like a stale combination between the two.
Extreme Behavior is Oklahoma City-based
Hinder’s debut album, released in 2005 under Universal Records. The album was released to an onslaught of negative reviews and critical razzing initially, even being hailed as one of the worst albums of the year on some music websites. However, Hinder would reach great commercial success with the release of their first single off the album. But it wasn’t until the ballad
Lips of an Angel was released in which the American public would come to recognize Hinder as a band they enjoyed. The song would reach #3 on the Billboard Hot 100 and reach #1 on the Billboard Pop 100. From that point on, Hinder would be known as that favorite hard rock band to many college kids and teenagers around the U.S, and so far nothing has slowed them down. However, Hinder’s success stops immediately with the commercial aspects of the music. What the band presents to the table is absolutely nothing. Instead of trying to further progress rock music today, the band manages to go with the Trivium effect, and instead try to create something that was once popular in the 1980s. I have heard the statements that Hinder is a modern day Skid Row and Guns n’ Roses, but those statements are utterly false. Rather than sounding like the gritty bands of the late 80s they come off more as a poor man’s Buckcherry and a standard Nickelback.
Hinder’s sound is based primarily around heavier guitar work and a more ‘hair metal’ attitude in some songs than their other contemporaries such as the aforementioned Nickelback, 3 Doors Down, and even Buckcherry. Like other bands of this type, Hinder succeeds only at making horrid music. The opener
Get Stoned is a great taste of what the rest of the album sounds like, because all of the other songs are based around the same sound. The standard generic power chord progression, weak lead line, and absolutely horrendous lyrics and melodies are shared in virtually every song. Stating that the melodies are weak in every track may be somewhat harsh, but it is not far from the truth, and Austin Winkler’s throaty rasp does not do a good job of making the poor note choices any better. Even the other big rocker on the album,
Room 21, fails to bring any form of new sound to the table, instead focusing on rehashing a similar sound that is omnipresent throughout the album.
But the biggest hole in Hinder’s sound lies in the ballads. They may attempt to resurrect the power ballad, but what comes out is nothing powerful at all. The breakthrough single
Lips of an Angel shows exactly why the band is described as one of the worst rock bands today. With yet another weak chord progression, the band attempts to construct a heartfelt ballad around more weak lyrical subjects, and Austin’s voice is simply horrid. Even when the band attempts to come to the most powerful point of the song in the guitar solo, it simply disappoints as the lead guitar shows no knowledge of musical theory, with the only moment that follows the background progression is just an octave chord slide that matches the chords below it. Once the chorus comes back it drags along until the final line, in which the listener can finally breathe a sigh of relief that the worst song on the album is finally over. Other slower and more heartfelt songs such as
Bliss and
Better Than Me fail miserably, only further rehashing the same sound and making it sound as bland as possible.
For those looking for a good modern rock sound,
Hinder is not the band to go to. As with any band using a stale formula for their songs, Hinder is a fine example of the atrocity of mainstream rock today. People can only listen to the same chord progressions and horrible vocals for so long before they begin to tire of it, and even just one full listen through
Extreme Behavior is difficult. Even Nickelback is able to put Hinder to shame with a more professional and accomplished sound, although they are just as trite as Hinder is. What comes of the album is just a dried and reheated version of the only decent mainstream rock band around today in Buckcherry, and
Extreme Behavior deserves any and all 'Worst Album of 2005' awards.
