CAMPAIGN, The Black Album

CAMPAIGN is a kick in the teeth. CAMPAIGN is about being over your head in debt, having to work a job that you hate just to put food on the table for an ungrateful wife and kids. CAMPAIGN is the face of the working class who are tired of being seen as working class and wish to rise up to something greater.

Through these five songs, CAMPAIGN manages to craft a sound that most easily reminds me of Hot Water Music, but has other influences in it, as well, such as bands like Trial by Fire, for instance. They don’t have your typical punk rock sound to them — though they do play fast-paced songs — but the songs do usually come in under two minutes. For the five songs that total this EP, they clock in at just over eleven minutes, so you can do the math there. (Added variable: one of the songs is only 59 seconds!)

On a song like “Slums,” you can really hear the Hot Water Music coming through. At times this becomes a bit of a burden for the band. They’re going to be compared to HWM — and rightfully so — to the point where they might easily be written off by many people as just being a band that sounds like another band.

The fact is, I believe CAMPAIGN may have something more to offer this musical world of ours than just being Hot Water Music Jr. I believe that these five songs are a basis for that very idea. If you listen to them, yes, you will hear Hot Water Music coming through in a very large way, but you will also hear a sound that CAMPAIGN is crafting to call their own. Hopefully CAMPAIGN can create a full-length album after this that will provide more of their own sound.