Disco de The Bouncing Souls: “The Gold Record”

"I heard someone say/that nothing gold can stay/but there's a love in all our souls/ and it shines like gold!"

Never a downtrodden bunch, The Bouncing Souls sound as energized and optimistic as ever, as shown with outstanding, hard-rocking opener, "The Gold Song." Its instantly memorable chorus sets the trademark energetic tone for the record.

The Souls have been a band for fifteen years, but they still sound invigorated to be playing music. Nearly every song is vital and urgent, with "Gold", "So Jersey", "Sound of the City", "Sarah Saturday" and "Letter From Iraq" rocking most sincerely. The latter ("Letter") features memorable lyrics written by 1st infantry soldier Garet Reppenhagen: "An eye for an eye/and blood for texas tea/at the call to prayer Al Queda's on his knees/Issac versus Ishmael/Allah versus Christ/Zarqawi's on the offense picking up the beat."

Besides rocking, its also one of their most musically expansive to date, with the mostly acoustic "Pizza Song" (complete with trumpet solo), the harmonica solo in "The Messenger", and keyboard-laced closer "For All the Unheard" providing a few pleasant surprises.

Naming an album The Gold Record could seem presumptuous. With the Bouncing Souls effort here, its fitting. Another fine record - just in time for summer! - from the Souls.

This album realy grew on me.The souls tried some new insterments out and they sound awsome.You just gotta have an open mind and just think of how fun it would be to be a part of something.And thats probably what happened.They just had some friends be a part of the GOLD record.To me that is way cool.The pizza song is a really cool song,its fun sounding.

I enoyed parts of this album, but still found myself skipping some songs on it. Overall it's quite good and worth the money, and I have to say that the song "Letter from Iraq" is one of the most powerful punk rock songs I've heard in recent years. Liek I said, good, but not great.

Like the Amazon editorial review says, they are masters of the rock & roll short story, "a committed storytelling as much in the tradition of The Who, Springsteen, Petty, and The Clash" as they are Warped Tour mainstays. If only Who, Petty and Springsteen (*especially* Springsteen) fans would come around and really listen: You'd come to love them.

I've been preaching The Bouncing Souls' gospel since 2001's "How I Spent My Summer Vacation", the best album of 2001 -- see my "So you'd like to... Hear 2001's Best Albums" list on Amazon at, [...]

Here's another thing that's not understood about The Bouncing Souls: They frequently write songs worthy of being heard in other styles, lyrics and melodies that could be sung from a Broadway stage. Yep, I'm proposing that, instead of destroying the Lennon, Wilson, and Dylan catalogues on Broadway, they could base a show on Bouncing Souls' songs. I can imagine a workable plot with a classic story-line based on adventures looking for a better life while traveling around the U.S. And "Gone" could be a big first act number, "The Gold Song" could be a big second act number, and a possible finale song could be based on "Sing Along Forever". It'd be a real rock musical, respecting the originals in energy and instrumentation, with authentic characters, without embarassing choreography, the punk rock equivalent of Rodgers & Hammerstein, but "True Believer" style.

It's an idea that probably makes for a lot of knee-jerk groans, but with this album The Bouncing Souls now have more than enough songs better than the average contemporary Broadway number, with the heartsiness and accessibility audiences respond to.

Until that happens, don't miss album highlights "The Gold Song", "So Jersey", "The Messenger", and "For All The Unheard", and sing-along ready "The Pizza Song".

I just got hooked on the BOUNCING SOULS this past summer while I was working in Seaside Heights, NJ on a TV show that most people in the area know about. I love the BOUNCING SOULS because their sound changes from album to album and the sounds correlate to the emotions and events that are going on in the band member's lives at the time. FRAKN AWESOME PUNK ROCK.