She's certainly getting weirder as time goes by; but I'm willing to write it off as just something of a genetic inevitability.
Even sans the pedo stuff, he's still a revolting Freak. (Note capital F.)
Somewhere in the back of all our
minds, we wanted them to reunite and make more killer music-- and then
it happened... and we weren't quite sure what the hell to think. Their
new music and configuration aside, Jane's Addition is / was one of the
top bands of the early 90's when modern rock was in its prime; when they,
the Pixies, and the Chili Peppers were as surfcore as it got. The perfect
soundtrack for the badboy in us all, their music will live on with us for
countless roadtrips to come [and grocery store trips too].
JAY-Z
Maybe it's just me, but there's something about fusing hardcore rap with showtunes that's just so very, very creepy; and maybe even wrong.
This CD has the distinction for being the most evasive to join my collection. Some time in 1992 in the middle of the night while listening to a San Francisco public radio station, they played a track from this disc, and it was one of the most exotic and intense precussion recordings I'd ever heard. For obvious reasons, I forgot the name of the group performing, but remembered that it was Balinese folk music performed on bamboo percussions. Years down the line once I hooked up to the internet, I began searching Balinese music in hope of finding it-- making the discovery that Balinese folk music is in the genre of gamelan music, and that gamelan music is traditionally performed with brass instruments. So using the words "bamboo" and "gamelan"-- the only two I had left-- this came up from the Music Boulevard listings. And it was indeed the right disc I'd heard so many years ago! The Jegog of Negara is an intense disc which rattles my walls nearly as much as my Atari Teenage Riot CD, and is so hypnotic that if you listen to it for too long, you'll start to zone out; an effect that a lot of gamelan has. It was worth the five year wait to have it in my hands: This is a disc truly unique to any other!
Remember back when "alternative music" meant a bunch of meloncholy English guys dabbling in dark guitar riffs producing music that made you feel depressed and want to slash your wrists-- God, those were the good old days. Somehow I doubt you could sit in a dark room and ponder suicide methods as you quietly chant the lyrics to "Closing Time" now, could you? Unlike Goth icons the Cure, The Jesus and Mary Chain actually vary the styles of their music from album to album; and even display a sense of humor, such as displayed in their wonderfully twisted cover of "Surfin' USA."
I'd pay anything to see Janis Joplin rise from the grave and strangle the life out of this priss.
While his song "Billy Club" is one
of the most rockin' out singles of 1998, his album seems more cannibalistic
of others bands' styles. It seems hard to tell if Junkie XL is trying to
be his own sound, or emulate/immitate the sounds of the Crystal Method,
Fatboy Slim, and Prodigy among others. This muddled sound is somewhat annoying,
although on a strictly mindless level (which is where a lot of good techno
takes place) the music holds itself strong in the ranks of guilty pleasure.
