The aptly and wonderfully named Hot Tubs are a secret project by Green Day. Here they play a garage band, sort of 60s, sloppy, noisy, a little fucked up and almost more fun then fucking. The whole package is intended for us to think of them as some lost reissue, from the name of the band, the mod packaging, the CD cover that tells us "stereo records can be played on today's mono record players with excellent results. They will last as long as Mono records played on the same equipment, yet will reveal full stereo sound when played on stereo record players."
So, it makes one wonder, should a reviewer treat this as a new album, by a new band, buy into the conceit of novelty they are trying so hard to sell us, or should we be treating it as a side project of Green Day itself? Or to answer the question itself, how much of Green Day's history is here? They used to be the master of the two minute punk song, a distinct, often funny, often self loathing reworking of pop tropes that fit perfectly into the ennui of teenagers. They were self aware, and only sort of political, and often lacerating, even when they had their fun. Then a hit ballad, and an emo takeover, where you were never sure how genuine and how marketable it was.. Songs about the decline of the American empire were selling well, and there had to be some attempt at becoming adults. They had lost their sense of fun, the career reassurance led to leaden anti-fun anthems.
If I was being cynical, I would say that this album then, was about having fun while not losing their carefully maintained reputation as downers. It is a clever lateral move, Billie Joe Armstrong was always had an adroit understanding of the history of southern California. It is a truism, or even a bit of a cliché, to point out the musical and demographic sensibilities of garage rock and punk rock—same audience, same raw sound, same belief in the power of immediacy over craft, same working/lower middle class ambitions—and this album has all of that in spades, in fact in can be used as an extended essay on the musical and lyrical similarities between the first few Green Day albums, and say, the first couple of discs on the Nuggets box.
In this sense, the creation of a personae, released quietly and viral, over the period of months, becomes a way of extending the simulacra of experience maintained here. It also leads you to wonder how exactly one reviews the record—as the new GreenDay record, as a lost garage record from the 60s, as something new but old sounding? In one line, if those are our three choices—It is a great indie record, a decent if atypical Green Day record, and a mediocre 60s rock release.
The thing that cannot be understated, though, is that the record sounds great. The guitars are fuzzy, pounding, and have a great propulsive energy. The drum fills are manic. Their is great care taken to pay attention to the melodic potential of the vocals. It will make you nostalgic for AM radio, with some marvelous sing along choruses (especially on the Mother Mary Take My Hand). In fact for something that is supposed to sound this sloppy, there is a consummate rise in the skill of the band. Regardless of the larger meta concerns this is an album that cares about sounding good, for reminding one of the nostalgia of a decent drum fill, a good guitar solo, a sing along loud sung chorus.
The problem, is and this is sort of ironic, for something that sounds like it is supposed to be so hook laden, and for someone with an almost perfect senses of the lyrical take away, at the end of the album there is little memory of what just happened. Think of it as a hot tub party that went a little too long, were the general impression of pleasure is looming present, but the specific details of exactly what occurred are understandably a little fuzzy.
