Hesher's debut comes out of relatively nowhere and will most likely end going there as well. Attempting various styles from old school styled rap to syrupy pop and traditional punk, the lack of focus and diluted sound of each genre tackled weighs things down like an anchor. The album isn't so much an "album" in the typical sense, rather its more of a an experimental project, calling upon countless guest performers and trying out numerous styles. Overall it could probably be compared to the likes of Brougham and Citizen King meets an avant garde indie band.

Vocally the tracks are helmed by Hesher aka Chip Love, who has a mildly husky voice that spreads itself thickly over the various songs included here. There's a handful of guest appearances from various performers, including Chino Moreno of the Deftones, Everlast, Biz Markie and Cibo Matto. Sadly though they are for the most part sparsely used and feel kind of trivial. Musically the CD doesn't focus so much upon a set band environment and instead goes all over the place from bubbly Japanese pop to gritty punk courtesy of the Bad Brains to a brash rapcore style and everything in-between, and although the variety of styles touched upon are a plus for the CD, the compositions and instrumentation feels underdeveloped and unimpressive.

The lead off track, "Presto-Change-O" is addictively catchy and quite possibly the saving grace of the album, as the rest of the material begins to form a downward spiral, with each track becoming more tiresome than the last. Another thing that dulls the action of the disc is the fact that although many Deftones fans may pick it up this for the guest appearance from Chino, his contribution sounds like nothing more than a looped sample of him humming and even his voice couldn't save the utterly flamboyant nature of the song. The fact is that from top to bottom, the songs feel very rushed, like there was little to no effort put into them at all, and although credit is due for trying to mix things up a bit with a vast array of different stylings, the inability to pull the bulk of them off pretty much makes these useless anyway. Hesher made a debut album, and if we're lucky, we won't have to see a sophomore effort, unless some serious effort is made to create something that actually contains substance.
(2 / 5)