Drive Like Jehu - 1994 - Yank Crime

The band's second and, unfortunately, final album, Yank Crime is as worthy and awesome as its predecessor, losing not a jot in the change from independent to major label status. Including some longer, more complex tunes this time around, Drive Like Jehu is otherwise essentially unchanged, fusing brawling, crisp rhythms and high volume intensity with technical complexity, feeling like a mad science experiment gone completely out of control. Aside from the guest backing vocals on the frazzled angst explosion "Luau!" by fellow San Diego music fiend Rob Crow, it's again all down to the band's four members, with drummer Trombino providing the strong, take-no-prisoners mix. Perhaps even more than the debut, Yank Crime solidified Drive Like Jehu's reputation as kings of emo. While use of that term rapidly degenerated to apply to sappy miserableness by the decade's end, here the quartet capture its original sense, wired, frenetic, screaming passion, as first semi-created by the likes of Rites of Spring. Whether making it short and sweet, as the surprisingly gentle instrumental "New Intro" demonstrates in three minutes, or taking time, like the nearly ten-minute conclusion "Sinews," the band wastes not a note. Froberg's sense of intense, almost accusatory delivery is astonishingly dramatic throughout, whether in full cry or with a touch of restraint, as on the rhythmic chorus of "Do You Compute." His guitar partnership with Reis is still in full cry, creating honestly epic zoned and screaming feedback roars and waves -- the aforementioned "Do You Compute" is one fine example, as is "Luau!," which builds to a awe-inspiring, eternally ascending rise. While a recording of the band's incendiary live shows would be the best way to remember the quartet, Yank Crime is a thoroughly excellent if unexpected way to bow out, artistic rock that actually, honestly, and totally rocks.

1 Here Come the Rome Plows Drive Like Jehu 5:44
2 Do You Compute Drive Like Jehu 7:12
3 Golden Brown Drive Like Jehu 3:14
4 Luau Drive Like Jehu 9:27
5 Super Inison Drive Like Jehu 7:24
6 New Intro Drive Like Jehu 3:32
7 New Math Drive Like Jehu 4:06
8 Human Interest Drive Like Jehu 3:24
9 Sinews Drive Like Jehu 9:12

¡Aquí!

Big Black - 1986 - Atomizer

After countless rock and neo-industrial outfits attempted to one-up each other's levels of extremity over the years, Atomizer holds up extremely well. It's not every day that one hears a song considering self-immolation as "just something to do" or another that tackles the case of an alleged parent-child molestation ring from the viewpoint of the offender. Instrumentally, Atomizer is a wailing behemoth of assaultive Roland beats, Steve Albini and Santiago Durango's clanging and whirring guitars, and new member Dave Riley's lumberjack bass. Their musical invention went a couple steps further, most obviously on the warped-beyond-recognition guitars of "Passing Complexion" and "Kerosene." The latter is undeniably Big Black's brightest/bleakest moment, an epically roaming track that features an instantly memorable guitar intro, completely incapable of being accurately described by vocal imitation or physical gesture. It's also Albini at his most plainspoken and bleak: "Stare at the wall/Stare at each other and wait 'til we die." It's Big Black's "Light My Fire," literally. "Bad Houses" tops Killing Joke in affecting moodiness, serving as a perhaps unintentional reply to John Mellencamp's "Pink Houses." Both Albini and Mellencamp were commenting on the Midwest, so why not? Other points of interest include the demented, storming menace of "Fists of Love" and a live version of "Cables" that features an extended guitar wobbly from Albini. The record remains as horrifying as the day it was recorded. [Atomizer was released on CD as part of The Rich Man's Eight Track Tape. The mediocre, largely instrumental "Strange Things" was removed from the digital version. Touch & Go kept the original record in print on vinyl.]

		1		Jordan, Minnesota	Big Black
		2		Passing Complexion	Big Black
		3		Big Money	Big Black
		4		Kerosene	Big Black
		5		Bad Houses	Big Black
		6		Fists of Love	Big Black
		7		Stinking Drunk	Big Black
		8		Bazooka Joe	Big Black
		9		Strange Things	Big Black
		10		Cables [live]	Big Black

¡Aquí!

Mars Volta

Picking up the pieces from At the Drive-In, Cedric Bixler-Zavala and Omar Rodriguez-Lopez formed the Mars Volta and wasted little time branching out into elements of hardcore, psychedelic rock, and free jazz that expanded on the boundaries of their previous work. Although their previous band's demise ultimately arrived before they were able to truly capitalize on their mounting commercial triumphs, the Mars Volta immediately impressed with their willingness to eschew conventional logic and push themselves into new artistic directions instead of opting for the more marketable sounds. (Interestingly, their progressive yet streamlined approach gave them the early lead among critics against their former bandmates in Sparta, the more emo-leaning of the bands resulting from the split.) Bixler-Zavala and Rodriguez-Lopez enlisted friends Ikie Owens (also of the Long Beach Dub Allstars) and Jeremy Michael Ward, and the Mars Volta debuted with the EP Tremulant in 2002. Still, as much of their reputation was built on the strength of their live show, their highly energetic performances resulted in a wave of word-of-mouth hype that elevated the band to near-mythic proportions because so little of their recorded material was available to the public. Sadly, Ward passed away May 25, 2003, from an apparent drug overdose at the age of 27. The Mars Volta had recently returned from an European tour supporting the Red Hot Chili Peppers, where they introduced brand-new tracks from the full-length De-Loused in the Comatorium, which was released via Universal the following June.

The band returned in early 2005 with their second full-length, the ambitious song cycle Frances the Mute. (They also issued the live set Scab Dates later that year.) Leading up to the release of third album Amputechture in September 2006, drummer Jon Theodore quit and was replaced by Blake Fleming (who had played on early Mars Volta demos). The album also featured an expanded role for the Red Hot Chili Peppers' John Frusciante. Less than a year later, in late 2007, the new single "Wax Simulacra" paved the way for the fourth Mars Volta album, The Bedlam in Goliath, which debuted at number three on the American albums chart. Less than two years later, the band had prepared their follow-up, a slightly quieter outing titled Octahedron that became their debut for Warner Bros. Rodriguez-Lopez has also recorded multiple times, producing more than a half-dozen albums within the span of as many years.

2003 - De-loused In The Comatorium

Mars Volta - 2003 - De-loused In The Comatorium

When Omar Rodriguez-Lopez and Cedric Bixler-Zavala silenced At the Drive-In in the midst of its popular emergence, there was no question that the two artists would return with new music as exciting as their previous band. However, there was plenty of discussion in corners and over drinks about what, exactly, that music would sound like. It was clear that much more was happening under those Afros than biting, post-hardcore anthemics laced with psychedelia. In 2002, Rodriguez-Lopez and Bixler-Zavala returned with the single "Tremulant," attributed to their new project, the Mars Volta. Its shifting soundscapes were certainly a hint, but with the Mars Volta's ambitious De-Loused in the Comatorium, it's clear the ATDI expats' mushroom-headed hairstyles hide bulging brains that pulsate with ideas, influences, and a fever-pitch desire to take music forward, even if they're occasionally led too far afield for the audience to follow. A concept album of sorts, Comatorium is a swirling ten-song cycle inspired by Julio Venegas, a childhood friend of the band who followed his fearlessness to a self-inflicted end. While the storyline is bewilderingly obtuse, it nevertheless unifies the album's wildly shifting sounds. Thrumming, Led Zeppelin-inspired pounding gives way to the thump of a free jazz bass punctuated with blasts of guitar squelch in "Drunkship of Lanterns." Meanwhile, the windswept landscape of "Roulette Dares (The Haunt Of)" unfolds over seven minutes, revealing remnants of ATDI, fissures of glittering, confessional pop, and layer upon sedimentary layer of a shrieking Bixler-Zavala, harmonizing with himself over vintage 1970s organ. All of this gives way to a gentle landslide of an outro, where an expressive guitar solo that would make Carlos Santana scratch his head threads its way between brooding bass. Later, Red Hot Chili Peppers secret weapon John Frusciante stops by for "Cicatriz ESP," which undergoes a full stop after its relatively straightforward (for these guys, anyway) beginning, reentering the atmosphere to the fiery strains of at least three concurrently soloing guitarists. Though the brief-by-comparison ATDI-ish "Inertiatic ESP" acts as an opposite to the epic "Cicatriz ESP," the band's ardent desire for re-creation is defined in the latter song's shifting folds and faults. But while De-Loused in the Comatorium may well remove the stigma from the prog and art rock forms it suggests, and is certainly a monument to unbridled creativity, it can also be seen as bombastic and indulgent -- much like prog has been in the past. Comatorium is exciting, to be sure. But in a way, it avoids answering that old question about the Mars Volta: What will the music sound like?

		1		Son et Lumiere	RodriguezLopez	1:35
		2		Inertiatic ESP	RodriguezLopez	4:23
		3		Roulette Dares (The Haunt Of)	RodriguezLopez	7:30
		4		Tira Me a las Arañas	RodriguezLopez	1:28
		5		Drunkship of Lanterns	BixlerZavala ...	7:05
Composed by: BixlerZavala, RodriguezLopez
		6		Eriatarka	RodriguezLopez	6:20
		7		Cicatriz ESP	RodriguezLopez	12:28
		8		This Apparatus Must Be Unearthed	BixlerZavala ...	4:57
Composed by: BixlerZavala, RodriguezLopez
		9		Televators	RodriguezLopez	6:18
		10		Take the Veil Cerpin Taxt	RodriguezLopez	8:41

¡Aquí!

Unsane - 2005 - Blood Run

Listening to Unsane's "business-as-usual" comeback album, Blood Run, one is hard-pressed to believe that all of seven years have passed since the New York noise rock stalwarts' released their previous studio effort, Occupational Hazard, and went their separate ways amid no small amount of acrimony. Even more amazing is recalling the innumerable musical cliques that have had their day and vanished in the interim; it seems perfectly reasonable that the infamously obstinate, fame-avoiding trio should see absolutely no reason to alter, or in any way update, their original songwriting M.O. for this new release (especially since it was largely the critical and public acclaim lavished upon 2003's career-spanning Lambhouse collection that actually egged the band out of retirement in the first place). So it is that Blood Run welcomes listeners back into Unsane's dingy, oppressive, and overcast soundtrack to urban decay -- a frightening place where every word uttered is a ragged scream, guitars clang against drums like hammers upon anvils, and unnerving shards of melody echo from standout tracks like "Backslide," "Killing Time," and "Latch" (all delivered with the nails-on-chalkboard shrillness of a New York City ambulance siren). Elsewhere, sludgy, drunken shuffles like "Hammered Out" and "Dead Weight" threaten disorienting, bowel-loosening miasma; and even the energetic, hard-driving numbers like "Release" and "D Train" leave one feeling as if they are the chased, not the chaser. Assembled as they are here, side-to-side like so many suspects in a police lineup, all of the above variations are unmistakably Unsane, making Blood Run an excellent and surprisingly seamless addition to the band's canon.

		1		Backslide		4:11
		2		Release		2:35
		3		Killing Time		4:55
		4		Got It Down		3:42
		5		Make Them Prey		4:21
		6		Hammered Out		4:43
		7		D Train		2:19
		8		Anything		3:27
		9		Recovery		3:45
		10		Latch		2:42
		11		Dead Weight		7:03

¡Aquí!