A couple weeks ago, Activision or Microsoft or whoever does the Xbox Marketplace stuff released a trio of new Dragonforce tunes for Guitar Hero 3, and I promptly downloaded thems. I was completely destroyed by them even more promtly. Promptlyer. Promptlier. C:\ prompt. Anyway, one of the tunes, called “Heroes of Our Time” was from their newest CD. I assumed it was a “Saints of Los Angeles” kind of thing where they were promoting the new album before its release. Nope. Turns out it was already out. Also, I bought it.
So it’s not so much that I don’t like Ultra Beatdown, it’s not that at all. I love Dragonforce. I love the balls-to-the-wall speed metal. It’s great. I just have one complaint: the lyrics. I know for something like this you can’t expect particularly deep or meaningful lyrics, but Dragonforce has taken it past the pop level of shitty lyrics. I was reading along in the cover booklet, and that’s pretty much exactly when I realized that not one song on this album has lyrics that make any sense.
I’m not sure if it’s an epidemic that plagues all of Dragonforce’s work, but if you take a look at the words to any of the songs on Ultra Beatdown, you’ll notice that they seem very chopped up and sporadic. It’s not uncommon for a line to have absolutely nothing to do with the one that comes after it, and sometimes it seems like a single line is made of two that were chopped in half and then had one piece from each put together. I have no idea how any of the songs could even possibly be pretending to be following the same general theme, nevermind the same train of thought. It’s like whoever wrote them just put words on a page and then changed a few so that it rhymed and followed something of a rhythm pattern.
It’s not really a huge put-off, but I do have a soft spot for thoughtful and/or intelligent songwriting. Ultra Beatdown is great if you’re going to be driving fast or for using as background music while playing a video game or something, but it’s definitely not meant to just be listened to and absorbed. But then again, Dragonforce was never that kind of band to begin with, so really, I guess I’m a little surprised that I expeced more from them in that way.