Mennen have been around since the mid 90's and Freakazoid is the bands 4th and latest release. Haling from the Netherlands the band was conceived by vocalist Joss Mennen and guitarist Eric Van De Kerkhof, Joss having done his time fronting a band called Zinatra and also lending his background vocals to various acts such as Danger Danger and The Scorpions.
Freakazoid is nothing more than melodic rock, now there's nothing wrong with that providing you have quality songs and something inventive to offer the listener, unfortunately Mennen fail to deliver in that respect. The songs themselves just seem to plod along at roughly all the same tempo and rarely deliver anything we all haven't heard a million times already. The band does seem to tackle their heavier tracks, such as "Bob" and "Wicked White", with a bit more energy. Both tracks give you a bit of a taste of Van De Kerkhof's chops on the guitar, however even those tracks fail to seize the full opportunity and the songs lose their momentum quickly, proof that even if you've got a few riffs, you also need the hook as well. I think the band would benefit greatly if they took their sound in a bit of a heavier direction and got rid of the commercial sound. When you have a guitar player who possesses as much talent as Van De Kerkhof does, you need to give him room to shine, but you also need to have the songs as well. In what is an already saturated market for this style of music, bands like Mennen are a dime a dozen and the songs on this disc unfortunately do not stand out.
Track Listing
1) Down
2) Above The Waterline
3) It's Over
4) Rain
5) Secret's and Lies
6) Bob
7) Freakazoid
8) These Good Times
9) Believe
10) The World Stopped Turning
11)Wicked White
12) Blue
13) Loose Somebody
14) Taste Of Paradise
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