Apparently Kickback is from France and is controversial as well as infamous. I'm not trying to doubt these claims but I haven't been able to find any reason why they'd be either of the last two things save for some of their artwork and the music video now streaming on their Myspace page. For a band that is nearing twenty years old you would think it would be easier to find out something about them but sadly it is not.
The band clearly wants to be taken as a threat of sorts. Between the confrontational lyrics, the fuck yourself - fuck your scene message on their Myspace, and the over angry nature of the music. Once again none of these things seem particularly upsetting or offensive to someone who listens to hardcore.
In any case, the band plays a somewhat technical noisy version of metallic hardcore. While there isn't anything overtly technical there is clearly a lot of talent in this band. Each song is heavy but seem to rely on tricks to hold them together or make them longer. Sadly these songs don't need to be as long as they are as they tend to drag through the noise pastiches implanted in them. I like cool noisy shit too but it is taken to a wholly unnecessary level by this band. Literally every song has some point between the verse and breakdown that relies more on feedback and distorted guitars than actually building a strong structure. The part that becomes distressing is when you do realize they are talented musicians and seem to be trying to find ways to make their songs interesting instead of just being a strong metallic hardcore band.
The other side of this is that the vocals are overly screechy. Noted that this isn't something that can really be helped. This vocal tick doesn't relieve the overall noisy style of the music itself either. What this does do however, is bring a more thrashy metallic vision to the music as well as embrace a certain desperation from the lyrics. Lyrically there is nothing overly different than any other metallic hardcore band it's about them and what they want to do, not you, your beliefs, or your judgmental attitudes.
Bottom line is this CD shows a band with a ridiculous amount of talent trying to distinguish themselves from the metallic hardcore pack. Unfortunately they seem to come up short most times. If the band can come up with more concise song structures to embrace their power i think they'll be able to make an album that blows people away. Until then we have a good album made by a talented band.
