"Biohazard" has been around for almost 10 years, to the delight of many hardcore fans. Billy Graziadei, Evan Seinfeld, Danny Schuler, and Rob Echeverria make up this incredibly intense band from Brooklyn. Their live shows are really something to behold, and this album attempts to take us there with them. Drummer, Danny Schuler had this to say about the shows and some people's interpretation of them. "A lot of people see 'Biohazard' as a negative thing, but the funny thing is we've always prided ourselves as being positive. They see the shows, kids dancing, diving off balconies, the craziness, and they mistake it for violent negative energy, when in fact, it's a very intense positive energy." I'll let you decide about that, I just want to tell you a little about the album.

This album is 24 songs long, so I'm not going to even try to cover them all, I'll just give you the highlights. It starts out with "Shades of Grey," which is really fun and gives you a good taste of what's to come. It talks about how issues aren't always black or white, hence the name. This is hardcore as it was always meant to be. You can understand most of what they are saying most of the time, yet it's still fast rough, and hard. They interact well with the crowd and the sound is really good for a live album.

"Authority" is one of those songs that I'm not sure portrays the "positive" image the band claims they have. With the chorus shouting "F*** the rules f*** f*** the rules," I don't know that some people would see this as a happy-go-lucky tune, but it is a lot of fun to listen to and great to dance to. I see it as letting out frustration, so it doesn't bother me in the least.

"Urban Discipline" has a long musical intro and is also high energy, even though it starts out slow and has slow points throughout the song. It's got a good message and is great to listen to. When they start up "Better Days" you know you're gonna hafta start slamming around like a maniac. This tune really kicks. The song is about how the world isn't exactly in the best place it could be and how the end is near. Not exactly a hopeful song, but it is interesting. It was also hard for me to take it seriously. Maybe it's the recent influx of such songs, or maybe it's just because the lyrics almost seem lighthearted, whether it's intentional or not.

"How It Is" is about senseless violence and how if you live a certain lifestyle, you're likely to get caught up in the violence and die. I'd like to think that it's a positive song about having the proper influences in your life. It sounds a little like rap, but not much, and it's a really terrific song. A slower song is "Tears Of Blood." Now, nothing this band does is going to be anything remotely like a ballad, but this is the closest they come. It's one of the longer songs and it's also one of the best.

The music for "Chamber Spins Three" is really great as it starts out, and the vocals are super too. There's a nice change as the vocals get passed to another band member for part of the tune. This was definitely my favorite song. I'm bouncing all over my chair as I type this up. "The Wrong Side Of The Tracks" begins with a quick drum solo and leads right into some fast, but not attractive, lyrics and music. The drums seem to be the best part of this song. I guess I could call it my least favorite. It's still better than a lot of the crap I've listened to by bands calling themselves hardcore, though.

The next song is "Waiting To Die." They say that the biggest problem we face today are people who don't care about anything anymore and refuse to try to make a change. This is one of the songs that makes "Better Days" seem invalid. If they believed the end of the world was coming, they wouldn't try to get people to get off their butts and do something positive. It's also probably a song that, without the band's comments before it, would appear to take on an unintentionally negative light.

"Punishment" begins with sampling a long monologue including "where is justice where is hardship." It was difficult to hear all the words, but it sounded cool. The biggest part of the song is the music. There aren't a lot of lyrics for the first half, and the second half is fast and a wild ride. The last song, "Hold My Own," has a real bouncy, jazzy beat at first and then heads back into straight hardcore as they start singing. This song ends the evening on a powerful and positive note. They talk about respect and even seem to cover parts of a few other songs a few words at a time. This is a blast to listen to and seems to be what "Biohazard" is all about. A great end track to a great album.

If you're a fan of "Biohazard" you have to get "No Holds Barred." It will take you through that concert excitement all over again. If you like any hard music with heavy lyrics, you should also get this one. I think that even though "No Holds" is a hardcore album, it can attract interest from many people, given a chance. The only reason I don't give it a 5 is that some of the sound is a little below par and not every song is really outstanding, but this is still a must-have for anyone who might be remotely interested in a rough and loud album.

The Refreshments 1996 major-label debut, "Fizzy, Fuzzy, Big and Buzzy," was a surprise hit that literally came out of nowhere, placing the Tempe, AZ band in the national music spotlight, and eventually going on to sell 400,000 albums. Not bad for a group of guys who initially got together through a shared interest in drinking beer, writing songs, and jamming. In fact, their first demo was recorded after only three months together and, according to vocalist and songwriter Roger Clyne, was "done absolutely inebriated. That's the way we were at the time, and to some extent, still are."

To hear Clyne tell the story, the success of the band, which also includes Buddy Edwards (bass), Brian Blush (guitar), and P.H. Naffah (drums), is largely due to the enormous influence of the blessed brew upon the Tempe, Arizona rock scene. "Part of our initial appeal was as much our drunkenness as the songs," he states. "Alcohol was part of our show. The drunker we got, the more they liked it."

Well, it worked for their debut album. Will it also work for their follow-up effort, "A Bottle and Fresh Horses?" The answer is yes - if what you require, what you crave - from the Refreshments is more of the same good-time, bar-hopping, south-of-the-border flavored tunes that made their first album so popular. As Clyne describes their new offering, "It's a lot like we were, but it's also a lot like we will be."

What remains from their past offering is plenty of jangling, twangy guitars, tales of cowboys singing the cantina blues, desperados making a mad dash across the Mexican border, sunrises and sunsets in the lonely, dry desert, and pictures of life in the most common of elements that still manage to be amusing. What they present for their future direction is a style that is "more mature, more grown-up, with a more introspective sound," says Clyne.

The opening track, "Tributary Otis," is the story of a man whose life is in a state of transition. "Preacher's Daughter" is the stock loved-her-and-lost-her ditty with a comic twist. Love on the run is the main theme to "Wanted," a plea for affection by a man hunted down by the law - or, " 'Banditos,' part two," quips Clyne, referring to one of the band's debut-album successes. The mood turns more philosophical in "Sin Nombre," the pensive tone making it a welcome change of pace from the previous selections, and a better example of the band's increased introspection.

"Good Year," the track slated to be released as a single, is yet another song of love-gone-to-hell. In the last track, "Una Soda," Clyne's voice is so laden with tears of drunken sentimentality that typically wash over anyone on a really good boozing spree, I kept wanting to buy the guy a cup of coffee and pile him into a taxi before he hung himself in the restroom he asks the bartender to point him towards. There are a few other selections on the album, each with their own tales of life's odd twists, and each with the signature Refreshments sound.

By the time I got to the end of the disc, it was easy to see that the new introspection and maturity the band has acquired from the past year of significant changes it has experienced, is far more evident in the lyric composition of the songs, rather than the musical. Musically, this is very much the Refreshments of their debut album, with not much change in style, or crossing into unknown territory. It's competent, and perhaps more polished, song-writing that graces this album. But diversity is lacking.

Truth is, if you're a Refreshments fan, the disc is money well-spent. There are no musical challenges threatening to separate you from their well-known sound, and you get a lot of the same type of tunes that you came to appreciate on their first album. If you're not already a die-hard fan, steer clear. Much like the beer that flowed so freely in their Tempe bar days, they are an acquired taste. For those not used to their style, it might sound a bit monotonous.