A new studio album with a few re-recorded old tunes smattered throughout the track list. Their longevity and still-obvious love for punk isn’t something to be laughed at or shrugged off, but it’s also not something to be held up to candlelight and lauded as sacred. What I mean is, if you listened to this album and it wasn’t the Lurkers, would it still carry the same weight? Would you still be as forgiving of its shortcomings? Simple fact is, I was still shitting my diapers and eating newspaper when this band formed and there’s certainly something to be said for the fact that they’re still pushing forward. And the album isn’t nearly as bad as some of the reformed cash cow records that bands of yesteryear have been putting out recently. That said, it’s also nothing spectacular. Hit and miss: the record’s mildly hooky, the production sounds good, the cover’s sinfully ugly and reminiscent of old Sloppy Seconds records, and minus a few choruses here and there, the majority of the record is ultimately pretty forgettable. So it’s a mixed bag here, which leads me to say that 26 Years will probably appeal to completists only.
–keith (S.O.S.)