Form of Rocket: Men

Form of Rocket
Men
Sick Room
2006-11-07

The guitarist of death-punk outfit Form of Rocket is named Peter Makowski. There is a song at the end of the album titled “Peter Makowski Has an Aneurysm”. I’m not sure what his father, Ed, thinks of this. Ed is a classical music guru. Why is this important? Because I’ve been working with Ed for years in music retail, and he kept talking about his son’s band, and now their long-gestating debut is in my CD player. Strange, huh? Though it’s doubtful that Ed would dig the song about his son’s aneurysm, he can still appreciate that if you’re going to do a rock album as dark as this, you might as well go full out. Song titles like “Teapot Dome, Bitch” and “Dogfucker” give you an idea of the contents inside, and even with the dry production and uninteresting guitar flourishes, their sense of melodicism is undeniable. The aforementioned “Dogfucker” is, in fact, a gut-wrenching and tragic ballad about loving a woman so much… until she commits the act mentioned in the title. “You’d Look Cute in the Trunk of My Car” is Blood Brothers on a budget, and they don’t sound half bad. Though someone needs to throw a professional producer their way, it’s still a stronger-than-it-has-any-right-to-be debut. Good job Ed — you should feel proud.

RATING 7 / 10