These two essential albums by
Exploited kick off with the undiluted fury of
Punks Not Dead, perhaps the essential statement of the first-generation Oi! movement. From the seething defiance of the opening title track through 15 tracks that may espouse nothing more than cliche after cliche but were all the more potent for it,
Punks Not Dead is weighed down with so many instant classics that the additional album's worth of bonus tracks appended to the end of the set almost feel superfluous. Almost -- but not quite. Single versions of
"Army Life" and
"Exploited Barmy Army," a live take on
"Blown to Bits," and such gripping time capsules as
"Fuck the Mods" and
"Hitler's in the Charts Again" are all essential rabble-rousing, today as much as they were back then. Slip over to disc two and the full manic mayhem of an
Exploited live show explodes into your living room. The 14 songs are based around the highlights of the studio disc, but they're incinerated by adrenalin and, by the time you hit the final outpouring, you too will believe in anarchy. ~ Dave Thompson
