by Stewart Mason

The third full-length album by Swedish skatepunks the Satanic Surfers continues down the same path as its predecessors: hookily melodic tunes taken at just slightly too intense a tempo to qualify as blink-182-style punk-pop, but devoid of the metallic edge that fellow Scandinavian punks like Turbonegro or the Hellacopters bring to the same basic style. There are a few stylistic changeups, like the faux blues remake of their earlier song "Evil" that's an unlisted bonus track, but for the most part, drummer/lead singer Rodrigo Alfaro sticks to the script. This may well be why the album feels just a tad too familiar to those who have heard the earlier records; despite the occasional great song -- the freakbeat "The Ballad of Gonzo Babbleshit" lives up to its inspiredly daffy title -- Going Nowhere Fast unfortunately resembles its title a bit too closely. It's not surprising that the Satanic Surfers' next album, 2000's Fragments and Fractions, was a near-total stylistic change into spikier, emo-tinged post-hardcore.