That Wesley Willis is no longer suffering is a good thing. But there’s a part of me that feels a little sick that Willis was mistreated by his “fans” – the people who bought his music (me included) and paid to see him – and exploited. He was, I fear, a circus-sideshow attraction.
It’s probably only a slight overstatement that Kronos Quartet has done more than anybody else to bring “classical” music to the rock world, by playing the music of Jimi Hendrix and Mr. Bungle but also by taking it seriously, and without sniggering.
The Gits only released one album before singer Mia Zapata was killed, Frenching the Bully, but it’s quite amazing. The record is good – debuts are rarely great, and this has all the typical trappings – but it’s valuable as a document of how good Zapata was.
My favorite albums starting with Fiona Apple’s When the Pawn …, Neko Case’s Blacklisted, The Clash’s London Calling, Coil’s Horse Rotorvator, and Jimi Hendrix’s Band of Gypsies.
Metallica seems to be trying to re-claim something on St. Anger, making a statement that the three-album “rock” (as opposed to “metal”) phase the band went through starting with Metallica was a detour rather than a destination. And it is quite a statement, although not very successful. Plus: Radiohead’s Hail to the Thief
Dismiss Monster Magnet at your peril. It’s certainly not difficult, but it’s unwise. The band might be all that rock and roll has left. The five-piece New Jersey outfit has taken the Black Sabbath/Led Zeppelin torch that Soundgarden carried in the early 1990s and stripped the 1970s-style heavy metal of its grungier self-loathing and self-importance of the past decade. By re-claiming heavy music from rap metal and what passes for “alternative” these days, Monster Magnet might just be the savior of good ol’ rock and roll.
