Face to Face

Item: How To Ruin Everything
Author: Gunner

How To Ruin Everything

(2002)

Reviewed by Gunner

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Label Vagrant RecordsDecapolisMarch 2002

punk skate punk

Face to Face were one of the first in the 'newschool' punk genre to really make a name for themselves, touring extensively and helping bring up other now-famous punk rock bands. Their 7th full length record, How To Ruin Everything, comes out April 9 on Vagrant Records.

Unfortunately, this album offers up nothing but the increasingly standard dose of melodic punk rock without any form of ingenuity, creativity, or musical growth. Not that this album is BAD per se, it's just that if you've heard Face to Face, or ANY melodic punk rock, you've heard this before. It could be argued that Face to Face helped create this genre in years past, and therefore shouldn't be put down just because we have an oversaturation of this style today, but there's not even one song that really stands out as particularly catchy or interesting. No matter what their history, mediocre is mediocre.

If you're new to punk, or never heard Face to Face before, you might enjoy this album, but instead I suggest picking up one of their first three albums (Don't Turn Away, Big Choice, Face to Face). Luckily the band has no aversion to playing all their old hits at their concerts, so their upcoming tour with Thrice and Midtown still promises to be a great time.

C-