Times New Viking aren't for the faint of ear. The trio from Ohio has no time for subtle recording tricks like EQ, proper levels, or fidelity. No doubt their recording budget hovered around the low two figures with most of that going toward beverages. The resulting album is a 30-minute blast of over-driven organ, squawking guitars, rattling drums, and pushed-to-distortion vocals that sound painful when played loud, and like a far-off hum when played quietly. Despite all this, Rip It Off is an incredibly good record. Maybe because of it, even. Beneath all the noise are songs with pretty melodies, huge hooks, and singalong choruses. Take the fuzz off of Drop-Out and you have a TV commercial, clean up Another Day and you have a girl group classic, fix the levels on Off the Wall and you have (possibly) a sweet love song. There is most definitely a pop band at the bottom of that layer of hissing sludge. Not that we're talking about an Archies record here, there is plenty of raw emotion on display (Rip Allegory, The Apt.), songs that have some complexity in their structure and delivery (Relevant: Now), and a huge dose of art, from the typewritten text on the cover down to the unique use of punctuation in the song titles. People might compare them to bands of the lo-fi era like Eric's Trip or early Smog, and those are good comparisons. Better yet would be to compare them to the lo-fi pioneers from New Zealand like the Clean or the Tall Dwarfs, or any band whose technical limitations (imposed through necessity or by choice) never got in the way of delivering a good song. Rip It Off is overloaded with good songs and provided you don't let silly things like clean sound get in the way of enjoying good songs, you might find yourself infatuated with Times New Viking. ~ Tim Sendra, Rovi

1		Teen Drama
2		(My Head)
3		RIP Allegory
4		The Wait
5		Drop-Out
6		Come Together
7		Faces On Fire
8		Relevant: Now
9		The Early '80s
10		Mean God
11		Another Day
12		The Apt.
13		Off the Wall
14		End of All Things
15		Times New Viking Vs. Yo La Tengo
16		Post Teen Drama