7SECONDS - Take It Back, Take It On, Take It Over! (CD) (2005)

Certainly fans of all ages hungry for punk with substance will not be disappointed by Take It Back, Take It On, Take It Over ' 17 sweaty, steely tracks of what Kevin proudly describes as "super-fast, back-to-basics, melodic hardcore...real hardcore, not the metal or emo shit." The album fittingly takes its title from a line in "Our Core," a track named after the new term 7Seconds recently coined to describe their music (incidentally, 7Seconds were also one of the first bands, along with Black Flag and D.O.A., to adopt the term "hardcore" nearly a quarter-century ago). Explains Kevin: "Let's face it, when someone like me says 'hardcore band' and some 17-year-old kid says it, chances are we're talking about something completely different. So I just liked the idea of coming up with 'our core' ' something that kind of describes us and other old-school-sounding hardcore bands who are bitter and fed-up!"

Although Take It Back boasts a rare melodicism and musicality that stems from Kevin's various side projects (the psych-rock power trio Drop Acid, the indie-garage group Go National, his lo-fi singer-songwriter solo work under the moniker Ghetto Moments) and the band's willingness to experiment ("We're all huge music geeks influenced by bands and artists we love, and we've never had a problem trying to do different things"), it's still straight-up punk rock, pure and simple ' unlike some of the poppier mid-period 7Seconds efforts that alienated close-minded, punk-purist fans. "The funny thing is how so many people have come around to really appreciating those quieter records over the past few years," Kevin muses. "But in all honestly, the harder, faster stuff is what we do best. We've loved every song and album we've ever put out, but strip away everything and we're just an old-fashioned hardcore punk band from Reno."