Artist: Big D And The Kids Table
Album: For the Damned, the Dumb, and the Delirious
Genre: Ska
Label: SideOneDummy

If I’m honest, I have never really been a huge ska fan, I’m not quite sure what it is about it that doesn’t appeal to me. I suppose it’s because it takes punk, and just makes it too light-hearted for me, I understand the appeal, but it just wasn’t for me. Of course, this speaking in terms a stereotypical ska band; guys in Hawaiian shirts and fedoras, playing trombones. I like my punk – and all derivatives thereof – to be disgusting; dirty and gritty, because they just don’t care, it’s a pointless bias, I know. I never associated that dirty punk feel with ska, it was a short-sighted assumption, but it just never really crossed my mind, so I really just ignored ska. But of course, it certainly did exist, with bands like Big D and The Kids Table, who formed right in my backyard in Allston, Massachusetts, so either way, I have to like it. Every city likes to support their local scene, but Boston takes everything to a whole different level; fanatical devotion to any band that is from the Boston area. And since I lived in Allston proper for several years, I’m obligated to like Big D and The Kids Table, regardless of whether I like ska or not. And this isn’t all blind following, Boston has always has quality bands. In reality, it’s just another one of my pointless biases, but I have to find the appeal in ska somewhere. And luckily, Big D and The Kids Table don’t rely heavily on that happy-go-lucky persona of ska that I hate so much, and when it comes to Big D’s new album, For the Damned, the Dumb, and the Delirious it really wasn’t hard to find something I liked. They aren’t my new favorite band – I still don’t like the reggae feeling verses – but I’ll take what I can get. Ska may not be my thing, but I’m still able to acknowledge a quality band when I hear one.

I do feel like Big D and The Kids Table were a bit ambitious by putting 17 songs on the album though, especially in the day and age where bands are expected to turn out albums on an almost yearly basis, and 10 songs have become the new norm for a full length. Big D tried to cram in 17, and while it was an admirable effort, I couldn’t help but feel like some songs just didn’t quite measure up. There was definitely a quality full length somewhere in this album, there were at least 10 very solid songs, but there were definitely a few extraneous songs that, given the sheer size of the tracklist, just felt unnecessary. Most of the songs were quite good, and obviously had some solid effort put into it, songs like “Set Me Straight” and “One Day” really stood out. “Set Me Straight” was a straight up, no excuses punk song, the latter was a very interesting and diverse track, transitioning from an acoustic ska-punk song, to a full on, driving punk song. But other songs were missing something, and were just sort of missing something, songs like “It’s Raining Zombies on Wall Street”, yes Big D is a punk band in the basic sense, but it seemed like they were trying too hard to do something controversial, but when it comes down to it, they aren’t Anti-Flag. It just didn’t quite feel right. The reason 10 song full lengths are the accepted norm now, is because 10 songs is generally the number of quality songs a typical band can write in a relatively short period of time, some bands are capable of more, but 17 is a bit of a stretch.

Unfortunately, I seem to have missed the boat on the whole ska thing. But regardless of that fact, I can say that this is definitely a very good album, not necessarily a complete one, but a good one. For the Damned, the Dumb, and the Delirious was let down by the filler songs mixed in to the album, the good songs did a good job of making up for the empty songs, but in reality, the filler just really shouldn’t be there at all. Old school ska fans are going to like this album, but they aren’t going to love every song, and they should really be able to.

SCORE: 7/10
Review written by: Michael Hogan

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James Shotwell

James Shotwell is the founder of Under The Gun Review. He loves writing about music and movies almost as much as he loves his two fat cats. He's also the co-founder of Antique Records and the Marketing Coordinator for Haulix. You should probably follow him on Twitter.

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