Papa Roach “Ego Trip”
Papa Roach are back with new album number eleven, the self reflective Ego Trip. Fourteen quick fire tracks of everything you love about them. Catchy choruses, hooks, musical dynamism and nothing longer than three and half minutes as Jacoby Shaddix and crew are back to power your house with enough electricity to last until their next release.
It’s in the lyrical content where the band unpeel themselves though, delving deep into mental health battles, external pandemic challenges, love and loss all while presented in compact bundles of irresistible energy.
Kill The Noise starts the album in excellent form with melodic vocals and switches from soft to loud with lyrics you will sing in the shower before lead off single Stand Up rumbles out of the speakers with the intention of being a stomper of track when played live.
The electric styles continue with ska flavoured Swerve, 80’s new wave Bloodline while the machine gun drums on Ego Trip are fantastic. The line ‘never get high on your own supply’ is just to darn catchy not too.
Eleventh album in twenty five years, Jacoby Shaddix and crew just don’t lose their energy or propensity to shake it up like a pair of a maracas in earthquake. They can do angry emo punk like No Apologies, pop like Always Wandering and the heartfelt ballad Leave The Light On all run side by side and don’t sound out of place.
Lyrically the album started with struggle with mental health in Kill The Noise and the album comes full circle with I Surrender with its heart breaking closing line of ‘I can’t let the broken record spin’. It’s a theme that weaves throughout the album as the band struggled through Covid.
The mantra ‘don’t bore us get to the chorus’ flows through every song. It’s big, loud, fun and full of hooks and melodies you’ll find yourself humming days later. It’s the perfect Papa Roach record, with a different explosion of Shaddix every three minutes away. Just press play, followed by repeat and enjoy in the incendiary glory that is Ego Trip.
Album Review By Iain McCallum
