The People Or The Gun

The seventh full-length Anti-Flag release (and first on Side One Dummy) starts off fast and furious with “Sodom, Gomorrah, Washington D.C. (Sheep in Shepherd’s Clothing)” as Chris #2 takes aim at those who use the Bible to control the masses, spitting out the lyrics with an urgency that makes his voice crack. If the album’s second track, “The Economy is Suffering…Let It Die,” isn’t nearly as reckless, it’s just as impassioned, recalling the more melodic moments on those first two albums by The Clash, as Justin Sane weighs in on the government bailouts of 2008, asking “Where are all the bailouts for the homeless and the poor?” It’s just the sort of question bands like Anti-Flag were born to ask. And there are plenty of those moments on “The People or the Gun.” Before they’re through, in fact, they’ve fired off a number of their most explosive political broadsides from the punk-rock trenches yet.