Blow in the Wind

We’ve got to admit, Me First & the Gimme Gimmes have a great gimmick. They’re a punk-rock supergroup made up of members of NOFX, Lagwagon, the Foo Fighters, and No Use for a Name, who, on their first two albums, covered the decidedly un-punk sounds of ’70s soft-rock and Broadway showtunes, respectively. For Blow in the Wind, they put their bratty bullseye on the songs of the ’60s and though the joke is beginning to wear thin, many of these songs hold up pretty well to the Gimmes’ sloppy-but-energetic interpretations. To their credit they lampoon a wide swath of territory here, from the hippies (Dylan’s “Blowin’ in the Wind,” Scott McKenzie’s “San Francisco”) to the Nashville establishment (Tammy Wynette’s “Stand By Your Man”) and the girl groups (The Shirelles’ “Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow?”) to the Beach Boys (“Sloop John B”). If you’ve heard NOFX’s snotty pop-punk you know exactly how this stuff sounds: too ridiculous to take seriously but too much fun to ignore.