Album Review: Pop Evil - Up

"What rock is missing is a hybrid of Metallica and Nickelback," said nobody in the world, ever.

Well here's Pop Evil's fifth album filling that demand with all the festering grunt and pomp of flatulent rhinoceroses in black denim. Power rock choruses sound great on the radio but on Up, Leigh Kakaty's troupe has gotten lazy with chugging guitar riffs and croaky yelling that validate anyone's misinformed accusations of nu-metal's predictability. In Disarray at least contains a briefly entertaining Steve Vai-inspired bit of guitar solo wankery, but Pop Evil have become nothing more than a bankrupt cliche.