Between naked punks with only socks on their cocks and (funk) rock superstars with “Blood Sugar Sex Magik”, the transitional album was this “Mother’s Milk” from 1989, released on 16th August 22 years ago. Just as curiosity, “Freaky Styley”, their second album was released also on 16th August, but four years earlier, in 1985.
Kiedis, Frusciante, Flea and Smith delivered a nervous, high energy material where funk and punk collided into groovy and pulsing music. “Mother’s Milk” also contains guitarist Hillel Slovak last recording, a cover version of The Jimi Hendrix Experience song “Fire”. Slovak died on June 25, 1988 due to a heroin overdose. The record also contains another cover, Stevie Wonder’s “Higher Ground”.
“Higher Ground”, “Knock Me Down”, “Taste the Pain” and “Pretty Little Ditty” are the more funky – and radio-friendly tracks – while “Magic Johnson”, “Stone Cold Bush”, “Fire” and “Punk Rock Classic” were kept the energy and rawness of punk and the other songs were blendings of both direction.
Read more Red Hot Chili Peppers – Mother’s Milk (1989)
fusion
Mr. Bungle – Mr. Bungle (1991)
As one of the (never resting and) “brilliant” journalist stated: they were the “most ridiculously terrible piece of festering offal ever scraped off the floor of a slaughterhouse”. 😀
1991 was a very good year, quoting a famous song title. Yesterday I mentioned Metallica’s “black album”, today’s Mr. Bungle’s turn and their self-titled debut album for Warner Bros after previously they released four cult demos.
In 1989 Mike Patton became the lead vocalist for San Francisco’s Faith No More replacing Chuck Mosley, getting the job after guitarist Jim Martin heard him on a Mr. Bungle demo. Patton in only two weeks, had written all the lyrics for the songs that would make up the Grammy award-nominated “The Real Thing” released in 1989. Mr. Bungle was formed in 1985 and Patton continued to be a member of both bands simultaneously and the band established a following in Northern California, but mainly the success of Faith No More secured them a record deal with Warner Bros. And between “The Real Thing” and “Angel Dust” it was “Mr. Bungle” – released 20 years ago, on 13 August. Read more Mr. Bungle – Mr. Bungle (1991)
GWEX – Debaucherous Adventure (2011)
Reminds me of Frank Zappa and Mr. Bungle, but also of Green Jelly and eatmewhileimhot!, The Global Warming Extravaganza comes between parody and insanity, chaos and music, and as always, it’s quite impossible to draw the line between genius and madness. Mark A. Shredmurder and Christopher T. (“The T is for Teriffic”) Bottomsworth supposed to form a band back in 2007, but the other guys didn’t showed up, so… they had to struggle through all the Budweiser and Jack Daniels bought for the party and the result is this monster-brain-child abbreviated GWEX.
And as any good thing in life, “Debaucherous Adventure” can be downloaded for free (“name your price” = donate much as you want/can) from their Bandcamp page.
Be prepared for anything – good and bad – you can think on/of because there will be more. Welcome to the “mEatrix”. This is fuckin’ unbelievable. But brilliant. 😀 Read more GWEX – Debaucherous Adventure (2011)
Fuseboxx – Animated (2011)
Quality progressive metal/rock from this Manila, Philippines band. Formed in 2001 by Abby Clutario – vocals/Chapman Stick/Keyboards, Mico Ong – 6 and 7 String guitars, Eric Tubon – synthesizers/keyboards/Keytar and Lester Banzuelo – drums/V drums, Fuseboxx delivered a quite exciting blending of traditional and modern progressive metal/rock, but sometimes building in smooth pop or jazz constructions and textures or explode in intense metal hurricanes.
Read more Fuseboxx – Animated (2011)
The Book Of Knots – Garden Of Fainting Stars (2011)
Tony Maimone of Pere Ubu, They Might Be Giants, Bob Mould, Frank Black, Lucinda Williams, etc, Carla Kihlstedt of Tin Hat Trio, Tom Waits, Sleepytime Gorilla Museum, 2 Foot Yard, and many many more, producer/engineer/guitarist Joel Hamilton (Elvis Costello,unsane,Frank Black,sparklehorse,Shiner, Players Club, etc) and Matthias Bossi of Sleepytime Gorilla Museum, Skeleton Key, Vic Thrill, etc) are the core members of this project.
Collaborators are including Tom Waits, Mike Patton, David Thomas, Blixa Bargeld, Jon Langford, Carla Bozulich, Norman Westberg(Swans), Dave Curren (Unsane), Megan Reilly, Cat Oberg, Zeena Parkins, etc. Already quite impressive, isn’t it?
And the result – the music – is similarly colourful, gloomy, shape-shifting, flowing and floating “something”. Something charming, hypnotizing or sweet like poison. Read more The Book Of Knots – Garden Of Fainting Stars (2011)
Dir En Grey – Dum Spiro Spero (2011)
It has been passed 2 years and 9 months since “Uroboros”, Dir En Grey previous studio album and fans are quite on fire waiting their eight album. They can surpass themselves? Delivering 14 tracks and over one hour of music, “Dum Spiro Spero”, I think worth the waiting. Dir En Grey remains the same gloomy, impossible to label, but intense and contorted, genreless, but colourful music band, one minute they can sound like a psychotic death metal band and in the very next moment they just simply switch into a pop theme. Songs like “Yokusou Ni Dreambox” will bring you through all of this and even more. God blessed hell of a journey. Read more Dir En Grey – Dum Spiro Spero (2011)
Nitin Sawhney – Last Days Of Meaning (2011)
Nitin Sawhney made 9 studio albums, for which he has been nominated for a Mercury Music prize, won a MOBO, 2 BBC Radio 3 awards and a Southbank show award, amongst 15 others. He has scored over 40 films for cinema and television, with an Ivor Novello nomination for best score leading to his recent much acclaimed Orchestral music to the BAFTA nominated BBC series “The Human Planetâ€, Mira Nair’s recent film “The Namesakeâ€, two film scores for live performance by the London Symphony Orchestra and a biopic about Jean Charles De Menezes. He worked with Sting, Cirque Du Soleil, Shakira, Paul McCartney, Jeff Beck, Taio Cruz, Imogen Heap, Anoushka Shankar and many others and he also has been a regular Dj with London club “Fabricâ€. He’s quite a busy guy. Read more Nitin Sawhney – Last Days Of Meaning (2011)
Free releases. Mr. Pan[k]sament
I have in mind lots of shit such as: “Money, money, money, must be funny in the rich man’s world”, “Now look at them yo-yo’s that’s the way you do it, you play the guitar on the MTV, that ain’t workin’ that’s the way you do it, money for nothin’ and chicks for free”, “Money don’t matter tonight, it sure didn’t matter yesterday, just when you think you’ve got more than enough, that’s when it all up and flies away” or “Money – it’s a gas, grab that cash with both hands and make a stash, new car, caviar, four star daydream, think I’ll buy me a football team”… Get the point, don’t ya?
As I said and repeat not for once, everybody sings, nobody listen anymore. And well, with this downfall of the global markets and this over-saturated music scene, actually nobody gives a shit anymore about anybody. So, all my releases are available for free download. Read more Free releases. Mr. Pan[k]sament
Hidden Number – Human_Error (2011)
I’m an idiot and well, I’m the first to admit it, but do you ever think of yourself as a Pavlov’s dog? Work from 9 to 6 – quite a slavery -, been attracted by a particular type of man or woman, eat the same type of shit and drink the same kind of beer – or whatever, watch the same TV channels and listen the same kind of music… If this is not the case of conditioning, I don’t know what it is. And our world getting grayer and grayer each and every day by eliminate the alternatives and everything comes down to be black or white. Or zeros and ones. Fucking spooky. But we’re tired and bored because we don’t see the third option. And well, talking bout numbers, there’s always a third option. And a forth, and so on. Hidden numbers…
And human errors.
Dean Swanson and his Hidden Number is a good opportunity to break the chain and listening something else which will do not fit in the boxes, you can stick labels to it. Well, only if there’s something human still left in you and you didn’t become completely a Pavlov’s dog… Read more Hidden Number – Human_Error (2011)
Tangled Thoughts Of Leaving – Deaden The Fields (2011)
This one comes from Australia and it’s a creative, breathing mixture of rock/post-rock elements with progressive and space-rock music and avant-garde jazz experiments while the space between is filled up with noises, intelligently built in electronica and cinematic soundscapes. Very fresh, unpredictable, colourful, flowing and ever changing.
“TToL emerged from the shadows of the Australian live scene with the release of their 2008 EP,Tiny Fragments and 2009 split EP with Sydney’s sleepmakeswaves. While their EPs attracted attention from
reviewers and punters alike, it’s as an intense and fiercely engaging live act that TToL have built their reputation in Australia. Through dozens of local headline shows,and supporting touring acts such as Australian prog heavywieghts Karnivool and Canadian doom lords Nadja in 2010, TToL have demanded attention and amassed a loyal following. Read more Tangled Thoughts Of Leaving – Deaden The Fields (2011)
