Love is a Battlefield of Wounded Hearts

Album Review

The first album that enabled the Hard-Ons to gain substantial distribution in the United States, Love Is a Battlefield of Wounded Hearts, like its predecessor, Dick Cheese, is an erratic affair. Both albums sound as if they were recorded at the same session, spaced in release by only a year's time and using a similar cover-art aesthetic: a busy, multi-colored psychedelia- and comic-inspired hand-drawn collage. Though there are some outstanding, blazing pop-punk tracks — "I Don't Wanna See You Cry," "Missing You, Missing Me" — there is enough metallic speedcore dreck — "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang," "Rich Scrag" — to leave the listener wondering why a band of this caliber would even bother. Sure, it's all in good fun, and either way, the Hard-Ons, given their talent, pull it off with aplomb, but they lessen the value of the gems they are stacked up against. It was on the next album, Yummy!, where those issues were finally sorted out and synthesized into a great rock record.