Nerf Herder – American Cheese (20th Anniversary Reissue)

A long time ago in a galaxy far far away those scruffy looking Nerf Herders released American Cheese via Honest Don’s Records, on a rare visit to the UK in support of the album they played the long gone and much missed Roadhouse venue, and somewhere I have a picture of a drunken me with a very sweaty member of the band, but I digress. This was the one time I caught Nerf Herder live, and it was in support of the album that has now deservedly received an expanded 20th anniversary reissue via Fat Wreck Chords. I’m not going to pretend to be cool, in fact quite the opposite, as I’ll admit that the first time I encountered Nerf Herder was through the theme tune to Buffy The Vampire Slayer, a minute of instrumental punk perfection that instantly grabbed your attention as the opening credits played, and to my mind one of the best theme tunes to grace any tv show.

American Cheese is the album where Nerf Herder had truly found their feet, the superb opener, Welcome To My World, remains one of my favourite tracks by the band in all it’s unashamedly geeky glory. I’m not going to revisit every track on American Cheese, the dozen cuts on the original were geeky lovelorn punk rock that sounded like it was conceived and recorded in one of the band’s parent’s basements, one cluttered with sci-fi memorabilia, comics all the other things that have become synomous with geekery. Nerf Herder are geeky as hell and proud of it and that’s no bad thing. Right now geek is the mainstream thanks to the rise of Marvel, and to a lesser extent DC, movies that means that along with this reissue the geek have truly inherited the earth.

What makes this reissue delicious is that this isn’t your standard repackaging with new notes and photos, I suppose they might misplaced them as I have. There is an impressive seven bonus tracks included that cover album outtakes, studio demos and even the starting point for most bands, the home demo. The most essential are the outtakes that didn’t get included on the album, Bark For The Bone, Weezer Star Wars Theory and I Love My Girlfriend all could have easily made the cut. The studio demo of Defending The Faith gives you a rawer recording of the much loved album track whilst the home demos of Welcome To My World, High Five Anxiety and New Wave Girl are what it says on the tin, rough prototype versions of those much loved tracks

There were increasingly long waits for anything further from the band, 2008’s IV and 1016’s Rockingham followed, but American Cheese remains, for me, the definitive Nerf Herder album. You really should already have this album in your collection, but now with the release of it’s 20th anniversary reissue with it’s additional tracks it’s even more essential than it was before, for newbies you get 16 studio quality songs instead of the round dozen and for the more hardcore collector you also get those precious rough demos. The force is truly with them.

American Cheese is available digitally with vinyl to follow via Fat Wreck Chords