Various Artists

Change! is the latest compilation from the team of Hopeless/Sub City Records and Hot Topic. Included in this release are one CD and one DVD. The CD has twenty-one songs. The majority of the songs here are your run-of-the-mill screamo-core acts: Chiodos, Saosin, The Devil Wears Prada, etc. I despise this stuff. I would say there are only a handful of songs on here worth listening to, but they are all previously available from the band’s regular releases: Converge, Gallows, etc. If you want people to buy something, give them something unique, not just a sampler of a bunch of songs already out there.

The DVD is something that I thought might have a bit more buyer’s appeal, but turns out all the videos found here are available through the bands’ or labels’ websites. Heck, most of them can be found on Youtube. Again, the videos I really enjoy are Converge, Gallows, and Every Time I Die. And its not that the other bands’ music is that horrible, but it is, it’s that their videos are exactly the same. Seriously, come up with an original idea!

Bottom-line, the only reason to purchase this is because a portion of the sales goes to arts and music charities.

3.0 / 10 — Michael