Various Artists
MTV Celebrity Deathmatch
Interscope
1999

Various Artist
World Wrestling Federation: The Music, Volume 2
Koch
1999

Various Artists
WCW Mayhem: The Music
Tommy Boy
1999

Call it smackdown rock - the roar of young men who take their musical cues from pro wrestling. As the WWF and WCW have boomed during the past few years, so have refried heavy-metal bands. Some of the smackdown rockers get a lot of radio play, like Creed; most don't, like System of a Down or Sevendust or Godsmack. They like the hefty sound of metal guitar sludge, blaring and bellowing with cartoon machismo. The singers never have anything to say, not even sentiments as basic as "You got me ringin' hell's bells" or "You shook me all night long." They're big on the operatic Sturm und Drang they learned from Metallica. They're not so big on shaping their bombast into songs with hooks, beats, riffs or even chord changes. They're also really pompous, even when they sound dumber than monkey butts. These bands can be genuinely fierce in concert, where their relentless force shakes your bones. But on tape, their power gets lost in a sonic blur.

Smackdown rockers do the job that bands like Styx, Kansas and Triumph did for their dads. They're blue-collar bands cranking out a ritual dramatization of all-American male angst. They come on like kindly big brothers to the kids in their audience, at a time when rock & roll isn't offering many cool role models for growing up male. After watching sensitive grunge dudes waste themselves on heroin, after watching Woodstock '99 degenerate into MTV's The Real World: Tailhook, no wonder these kids are screwed up, and the smackdown bands tap into their confusion about gender-role traps. So call it knucklehead metal, moronica, tunes for goons, jarhead jollies, neanderbang or just lunkcore - it's the new metal sound for an audience to whom Nirvana and Pearl Jam are old-fashioned classic rock.

The Scream 3 soundtrack is a handy sampler, a crash course in the state of the dumb-ass: eighteen tracks, all fitting the smackdown style, from the usual suspects. How can you tell when one song ends and the next begins? It's easy - the number on your CD player changes! Creed grind out metal platitudes a la Rush, without any glittering prizes or endless compromises to shatter the illusion of integrity. Excellent live bands like Sevendust and Powerman 5000 show that their songwriting is still too mushy to translate to the studio. There's also "Dope," "Suffocate," "Fall," "Crawl" and "Wait and Bleed" - some of these are band names, some are song titles, and only their moms could care. The low point? Orgy, fresh from their god-awful New Order cover, get the strange idea that their own songs are fit to play in public. They're not, actually, although the title "Dissention" has a nice New Order-like touch.

The album inspired by the MTV show Celebrity Deathmatch has more musical variety, but it's still your basic goonfest. Marilyn Manson continues his downward spiral with a song that sounds like Ozzy basted in glitter and embalming fluid, while rockers (Sevendust, Powerman 5000, Primus, Rob Zombie) and rappers (Eminem, Canibus) go through the motions. The Wondergirls (who are boys) and Bif Naked (who isn't) do songs about sex that actually generate some heat, which means they don't fit in at all. The Any Given Sunday soundtrack has more hip-hop, including DMX, Trick Daddy and Mystikal, but Kid Rock, Godsmack and Overseer make sure the goons go home happy. Hole's dismal throwaway, "Be a Man," also appears, because . . . because . . . can I call my lifeline, Regis?

The last word belongs to the wrestlers themselves, as the WCW and WWF squeeze out skimpy soundtrack CDs. The WWF's Music, Volume 4 collects entrance themes and vocal cameos from stars like Stone Cold Steve Austin, whose musical IQ hovers around 3.16, while WCW Mayhem: The Music is just smackdown backwash. Has-beens like Slayer, Megadeth and Cypress Hill audition for the state-fair circuit, while Kid Rock and Metallica unload tracks not good enough for their own albums. Limp Bizkit do a parody cover of George Michael's "Faith" - again? Yes, again. These poor boys are so busy not inciting riots, they don't have time to think up new jokes. And the Insane Clown Posse cut sounds like the Wonder Woman theme, which is my idea of poetic justice.

You also get cameos from Goldberg and Hulk Hogan, fake-sounding crowd noise, and, if you listen closely, the quiet but unmistakable sound of $17.98 bubbling down the drain as you get an hour older. If you're a teenage boy who can't find a livelier way to piss off your parents, consider needlepoint. Sure, growing up is tough, and sure, these bands could be a lot worse - at least they don't push misogyny, if only because they barely even mention women. (Most of these guys sing about making out as often as they sing about Maoist agricultural policy or chess strategy.) But there's no emotional risk or danger as they race on the gerbil wheel of masculinity. Teen-male angst doesn't have to be this dull - and neither does rock & roll. (RS 834)

ROB SHEFFIELD

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(Posted: Feb 17, 2000)