Twenty-six years on and they still haven't found a new sound -- because they haven't needed to.
The Vibrators
long ago established themselves among the great impermeables of the
British punk
scene, timeless masters of the ballsy
power pop
riff machine that has spawned more fearless imitators than just about any other direction posited by the original
new wave
explosion.
Energize
is
the Vibrators
' 18th album, but it could just as easily be their eighth, or any other number you like. So no surprises, no shocks, and, for the confirmed
Vibrators
acolyte, no disappointments. Dividing its energies between the verging-on-
metal
roar that has marked their last few albums and the pure, melodic buzz saw that dates back to
"Baby Baby"
(the classic-in-the-making
"So Far Down"
is one of the band's best ever), then glancing down all the other little avenues that they've visited in the past,
's greatest virtue isn't the fact that it's glorious business as usual, but the implausibility of that business still being glorious. But a couple of choruses of the pounding
"New Brain"
are all you need to hear before
re-energizes all your old enthusiasm, and
' vibrations are as powerful as ever. Here's to the next quarter-century. ~ Dave Thompson