Faith No More...'A Small Victory' for mankind.
In 1988, Faith No More's
"The Real Thing" was delivered to the world, wrapped and carefully sealed with a small hit called
"Epic" Initially, the album was carefully treated, opened with a sense of excitement and risk. The album contained some straight up funky hits as well as songs like
"Zombie Eaters" and the title track
"The Real Thing" which hinted at a more experimental edge . Mike Patton was 21 years young at the time, and was the spark that the band ultimately needed. Whether or not Patton realised what he was getting himself into, one would have to wonder....
1992. Faith No More delivered to the world
"Angel Dust"
On the edge of making it big in the music world, this album revealed two conclusive things..
A) Faith No More were masterfully pulling strings on "The Real Thing" by only showing us the tip of the iceberg....
and
B) In a four-year gap between albums, Faith No More realised that the music industry needed a shake-up...
Rather than attempting a track by track offering, it'd be suitable to compare the songs to numbers on an Earthquake Richter scale.
0 means barely a ripple, 10 means right off the f****n scale!
Ironically, no tracks on here are below 4 on the richter scale.
RICHTER SCALE
4. Everyone will experience a
"Midlife Crisis" one day.. And if you grasp the advice of Mike Patton you'll be right.
"Sense of security, holding blunt instrument, midlife crisis" he sings in full melodic glory during the chorus.
Roddy Bottum's touches on the keys are quite creepy, he really adds another dimension to this song.
The last minute of the song features some of Mike Patton's best vocal harmonies -
"Your perfect yes it's true!....But without me you're only you" as his vocals are overlapped with the line
"Go on and wring my neck!!"
Newcomers to Angel Dust should start with this track.
4.5-"Land Of Sunshine" kicks off the album with a real explosion. Props must go to Bill Gould's awesome pop'n'slap bass line.
During the chorus Mike Patton sings
"Does life seem worthwhile to you?" lapping over a vocal line of hysterical laughter (again from Patton's voicebox)
At first listen it sounds.... awkward. Well relax. Over the course of this album there is plenty of moments where Patton's melodic singing will clash with abrasive guitars or vocals. Jim Martin lays down a nice solo near the end of this song. Awesome way to start the album.
5-"Crack Hitler"
Starts off with a recorded air flight message in an airport somewhere..
" Now boarding ...Flight 810 to....Miami..." Then slowly building in the background is some insane wah-wah guitaring from Jim Martin. Then Roddy Bottum joins the flight party with his gothic keyboards.... Then BANG! the explosion of Puffy Bordin's drums and Gould's pop'n'slap on the bass.
The chorus then features more melodic singing from Patton -
"HES THE ONE NO DOUBT! WALKING ON A TIGHTROPE! The lyrics are slightly cryptic. But the secret to this song is Mike Patton's convincing performance as a drug lord.
"In regards to my usage of the drug...it modified my personality...to the extent that I was highly irritable...I was like a Crack Hitler!!"
It's a truly outstanding feature of this album, that Mike Patton not only sings about the characters but
becomes the character.
6.2 Now we're getting higher on that richter scale. The next song
"R.V" (which I think stands for Recreational Vehicle) doesn't make an impact with force, but rather with pure lunacy. Listening to this song too many times could cause fits of complete laughter. This band had humour, that's for sure.
Mike Patton again shows his talent to
become the character of the song. The character is a middle aged man loathing about his life in some run down suburb of America..
"Someone taps me on the shoulder every 5 minutes" sighs Patton.
"Nobody speak english round here anymore!!"
As Patton sings this you can almost see him downing his sorrows in a fat greasy pizza and a beer...
Okay so "R.V" isn't classic Faith No More material but the band doesn't stick to many rules on this album. Listen to this song just to hear Mr. Patton sound like a trashy Johnny Cash. Hilarious.
7-"Smaller and smaller"
Fans of metal should like this song. But don't go looking for any fast palm muted riffs, for the metal is in the songs intensity, not the sound. When listening to the chorus of the song, it becomes clear where the Dillinger Escape Plan's of this world got their influence from.
In fact that's really what separates this album from other Faith No More material. Mike Patton's vocals. He must be coughing blood when he screeches
"Bite...bite..biiiiite....cryyyyy" during the chorus.
There's an awesome middle section of the song that just has to be heard. Native American chanting with a swirling beat of bass and tribal drums, hinting ever so slightly at the subject matter - a drought, and then a sudden outpouring of rain, much to the workers delight. To see a brilliant interpretation of this song go to:
http://www.songmeanings.net/lyric.php?lid=5084
7.5-"Be Aggressive"
With a lone, gloomy organ dirge for an introduction, Faith No More do a great job of tricking us. For this song is about Oral Sex. Roddy Bottum is given time to shine here. Lyrically and musically. He lays down some groovy keys complemented by Jim Martin's awesome wah-wah guitar. Similar in structure to 'Crack Hitler', this song features a chorus of cheergirls singing
"BE AGGRESSIVE ..BEEE AGGRESSIVE" B-E A-G-G-R-E-S-S-I-V-E"
Once you learn of the subject matter of the song, it becomes a lot clearer as to why the bombastic chorus was needed.
The little touches of symbolic genius FNM could put in a song was a reason why they were so innovative.
9.5-"Malpractice" Recently covered by Between the Buried and Me, this song exists only to test the listeners patience. It's got a really dense wall of sound, punctuated by Roddy Bottum's sinister, brooding keyboards. I'll be honest here, this song never caught my attention for years. It has a really deliberate sense of awkward timing and abrasive vocals. But slowly the chorus (if you could call it that) became more melodic to my ears.
"Cold hands" "Your hands" sings Patton during the chorus.
He doesn't waste a single note in this song
Lyrical subject is again the vehicle for which the band performs so convincingly...You'd swear you as the listener were in the surgery room experiencing every moment of this strange operation...(Tip: Gynaecologist)
9.8 "Jizzlobber"
If you could trace the whole nu-metal movement back to one song, this song would probably be it. Wow that's a bold statement right there!
Proof: Listen to any Mushroomhead song. Listen to any Slipknot song. Listen to any Linkin Park song, or any Korn song. Maybe even the Backstreet Boys rocked out to this one..
But hear me now, I consider it an insult to call this song the nu-metal trendsetter. Every band since 1992 hasn't come close to capturing the essence of this track.
I really don't need to explain the song itself but there's one line of vocals that I feel I should mention:
"I'm trying so hard to act like nothing happened (No one left to blame, no one left to blame!"
I can't imagine how awesome that vocal line would've sounded in 1992. HECK, it sounds awesome right now and it's 2006!!
10-
Angel Dust. Off the richter scale. Thousand of victims still lie under it's crushing wake. Some listeners have survived. 14 years after the initial blast, this album is becoming more important each day.
The Aftermath
Obviously with an album so varied, it's going to have it's share of flaws. But the flaw for one listener could be the reason another gets up and dances around madly. So instead of pointing out flaws, i'll put it like this. The album has parts where you'll be scratching your head trying to work out what the song is trying to achieve. After repeated listens, some parts will jump out at you with new vigour. Not everything on this album makes for ear-candy or quality listening. Alas, Faith No More didn't want to sell records.
They sold their ideas and their innovative tools
Isn't it frustrating when you mention Faith No More to someone they will usually say;
"Ohhh yeah I don't really like that Epic song, it blows"...
I laugh, because to think that this band is the same band that released the one-time M.T.V hit (Epic) is near unbelievable. This album is consistently ignored by the general public and critics alike, yet those same critics lavish praise on bands that owe their souls to Faith No More.
Pros:
- Mike Patton's performance goes beyond his vocal ability. He completely raised the bar on this album and I haven't heard anything from any singer, regardless of genre, to suggest that he's been bettered.
-Roddy Bottum, Mike Bordin, Jim Martin and Bill Gould all have significant input across the album. A team performance.
- Musically diverse
- Highly influential
- Lyrics a huge step up from "The Real Thing"
Cons:
- Production is quite muddy (deliberate or not I don't know)
- Guitars could've been better, solo's lack the x factor.
- Takes a long time to grow on the listener.
- Everything's Ruined chorus
- Hard to explain exactly what 'feel' this album has.
