Ah, this is a nice little change. Let’s cut straight to the chase on this one shall we? Did you ever like Mr Bungle on the first album, before they kind of disappeared up the arse of avante garde musical pretension? Or even like them on say the OU818 demo, which was even better than the album? Well, anyway, if you answered yes to either question, then go to the address bit at the end of this review, and start working out the conversion rate to order yourself a copy of this here CD. Because to my ears, that’s the area Nuclear Rabbit are operating in. There’s the death metal like guitar clashes that then give way to a jingly little break, the bass laying down all sorts of rhythms with the drums, and vocals that do their best to career all over the place. In one 30 second segment. And I like that sort of thing. And best of all, pretty much most of the time, there’s a song here as well to back it up, not just a collection of disjoint musical segments. Of course there’s some silly things as well, such as the Dumb Dumb and Crane to the Head But with song titles like My Girls Got Guts, I Iguana and more, it was never going to be entirely serious. The Return Of Agent Embryo highlights the band at their accessible yet bizarre best.

Of course, if I’m being harsh and critical, as it is operating in the Mr B area, then vocally it’s going to come into comparison with the incomparable Patton. It doesn’t quite reach those standards, but let’s face it, who does? But that’s not to say that it’s a weakness here. It isn’t. It’s just the obvious comparison and benchmark that is going to be levelled at them. Also, they’ve gone and done that bloody hidden at the end of the last track bonus thing. God I hate those fucking things. So utterly utterly pointless. And they do it twice! Just tag the goddamn stuff on to the end of the song, no with a bleeding gap whose sole purpose is to convince you on buying the CD that you’ve got a humdinger value for money 73 minute little beaut. Sorry, it’s one of my pet hates. It can join the rest of the zoo. Pet. Zoo. Rabbit. Oh please yourself then! But, in spite of that, this is still a great CD that is fun to listen to.

So with the demise of FNM, we have Incubus looking for the throne, and the disappearance of Mr B to art, Nuclear Rabbit are looking to slip away with that crown. They may just make it. But there’s another contender that I’ve recently found out about. They’re in this issue somewhere. You’ve just got to go looking.

And let’s face it, credit where it’s due. Thanks to Stella for originally mentioning them, and passing my name on in order to get a copy to review.

Contact: Nuclear Rabbit P.O. Box 1005 Novato, CA 94948-1005

Web site: http://www.nuclearrabbit.com/