Their new album, Viciously Delicious, is out on Eureka Records/Discovery Records. The album contains fourteen tracks that will relax you, but at the same time the lyrics will force you to pay attention to what they have to say. The gentle flow the album provides is very relaxing, yet at the same time it packs a big kick to it, and holds many surprises! From the faster paced track "Swimming With Sharks," and it's fierce guitar, to the hooks from loud to relaxing beats of "Invisible," there is a lot to this album. Track four, "Twenty Something," starts off a 80's heavy metalish vocal scream, but then it grabs ahold of it's good old pop roots, and kicks into full gear with lyrics like, "I'm twenty something and I'm diseased/and I still wear holes in my jeans/wish I were still in my teens," and then to it's 70's rock guitar and back to the chorus that will hook you, just like a Catfish. Onto track six, "Masochist," which is a very gentle song with it's calm guitar and soothing vocals. But there is more to Catfish than their pop-rock front. "Funky Junky," proves this with it's hard intro, funk guitar beats, and the unsettling vocals that switch back from hard to soft and back again.

All and all, Catfish is a pretty solid band. They are best when they are soft and gentle, because when they try to get harder and faster, they lose the momentum and the feelings that the lyrics will project to you, if they were softer. I would have to give this CD a B-. Some parts are very good, while others flounder in the memory of the more solid tracks.

Catch 22: Washed Up!

Cathedral: Caravan Beyond Redemption

[Issue One // July-August 1997]