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Rating: After the fall of '91, a date that needs no introduction, prominent producers and prestigious labels began seeking out all the bands in the Seattle area, more precisely around Aberdeen; to name a few: Tad, Mudhoney. Unfortunately, this obsessive search not often delivered thrilling results to grunge: bands used to celebrating their awkwardness felt quite uncomfortable when they had to play in perfectly equipped specialized studios. Many bands, therefore, tragically sacrificed their raw and fierce compositions into pop sentimentalities. The results were: flops, commercial failures, dismissals, break-ups of the formations, and consequently, very often, even more obscene and squalid projects; and other catastrophic consequences. In '93, Buzz Osborne's band reached Atlantic: yet another band that had been working for smaller record labels until then. That band was the Melvins, and that producer, "actually, only of six songs," was Kurt Cobain, and Houdini, did not insist on imitating what almost all the other grunge bands that were now working for majors were doing, but veered towards alternative horizons, without ever betraying their dirty and rocky sound, "although it must be recognized that this is really one of the most accessible chapters of their discography."
It is impossible to label Houdini, just like every other album of theirs, because it is a music that only they know how to play, a noise that only they know how to produce. In short, a chameleon-like album; more specifically, divided by the two fronts that have always characterized the music of the Melvins: their more atrocious side, where a distorted, dark, heavy, and minimalist heavy reigns, cunningly playing at the borders of doom; and their more philosophical and experimental side, "much more accentuated from this album onwards." Once again, we are faced with something accomplished, successful, bizarre, a dirty, yet refined album. And then, the cherry on the cake: Cobain, a good friend of Osborne and Crover, produces and plays guitar on Sky Pup, and together with Dale, performs a ten-minute percussion-based solo.
A slow drumming, and then a distorted, slow guitar, "in perfect Melvins style," a choked voice, and a corrosive chorus: this is Hooch, a new classic of the group, as well as one of the singles that most harkens back to their earliest works. No less important is Night Goat, which, starting with a rather unsettling bass line, flows into an even more martial chorus, garnished with Osborne's sinister wails. Lizzy is, instead, a carefree punk rock track, slow and incisive. Honey Bucket, "a crushing track," demonstrates the group's skill in sustaining even unthinkable speeds, while in Hag Me, we return to the funereal slow motion of the beginnings, with a guitar so distorted it sounds like farting. With Set Me Straight, the experimental games begin: a mix of punk, pop, and psychedelia aimed at connecting the Beatles with Nirvana. In Sky Pup, Pearl Bomb "with many industrial influences," and Teet, Black's skill, which had previously been eclipsed and hidden multiple times, is highlighted. In the ten minutes of percussion in Spread Eagle Beagle, the group closes, "if not a masterpiece," an honest, simple, and well-made album.
Brilliant in its genre, "whatever it may be".
Tracklist Lyrics and Videos
01 Hooch (02:50)
Los ticka toe rest. Might likea sender doe ree. Your make a doll a ray day sender bright like a penelty.
Exi-tease my ray day member half lost a beat away. Purst in like a one way sender war give a heart like a fay. Cuz I can ford a red eed only street a wide a ree land. Die-mond make a mid-evil bike a sake a like a ree caste. Cuz I can ford a red eed only street a wide a ree land. On a ree land. Find a ree land.
You sink a my swan. Rolly a get a worst in. Maybe minus way far central poor forty duck a pin.
Milk maid dud bean. Master a load a head. Pill pop a dope a well run general hash pump a gonna led.
02 Night Goat (04:41)
NIGHT GOAT
She walk my way to fee
And I grut my teeth
It's more like hundred milo
And I know more me
But you can make my teeth growl
You can make my underwell
It's a big dark world now
It's a big dark Hell
Los sitar watch out for your tails
Like of course a timely man
Like a hog dance
Like a pig dare
Mind warp deceptor wan
Wait a minute I caught defouled
And I felt it groan
She meant to hold the bar down
And she cleaned my nose
I look so peaceful
And I look so underwell
I ain't got no mouthfull
I ain't got no tail
You look like such a worldy man
Like a sinner tossed on the wind
Like a hotel
Like a piston
Like a well old man a wan
Rock sides supports them would you wail
Like a tosser timely man
Like a hard descend
Like a cyst stone
Like a well worn dance stone why
03 Lizzy (04:44)
LIZZY
I'm sin done in water
You might be over hill
He's somebody's daughter
As far as Liz well knows
Sin me a black one
Bubbled in a big sun
Open with a cast ray
A mystery mind
He sits her with father
We seem so in a two
Open up a C.A.T. scan
White leather free land
Wishy little be scar
Half-made mind
Elvis had a daughter
Not half-boned siksura
Heavy Betty big bone
Little kitty fig bomb
I'm no feet less
Keep me one
Eat more with your collar
Call egg mig mig me in May
Time is a big one
Only have to free us all
Misery to hope laid
Have them with the bong hit
Exit measured one seev
And I'm break and kickin Gary
I'm riggin with the clothes bend
I hang my bong
04 Going Blind (04:32)
And I know how it's to be
There is nothing more for you and I
Some are young and some are free
But I think I'm goin' blind
Cause, I think I'm goin' blind
And I know how it's to beeee
Little lady cancha see?
You are so young and so much different than I
And I know how it's to be
Can't you see I'm going blind?
Cause, I think I'm going blind
And I know how it's to be
Cause, I think I'm going blind
And I know how it's to be, yeah
Little lady can't you see
You're so young and so much different than I
I'm ninety thre-ee-ee-ee, you're sixteen
Can't you see I'm going blind
Yes I think I'm going blind
And I know how it's to be, yeah
05 Honey Bucket (03:01)
Eight times of fel-an-fo-fi
Like cobalt cast and clean
I got a mojo felt the wheel
Real fashion feel
Tri-Jack it, black it for more
Handcuffs with special keys
Triple locked and been down defiled
It's a V. S. I.
Throw a case of plasticine down
Baby I can immolate
And it's rotten in my rounds
Sister's in my way
I'm as fast as my home town
Green glass it most of all
Been around this foreign cage
Villiage in the wall.
07 Set Me Straight (02:25)
I know something that you would never believe
I wish I was able to finally make you (agree).
Now, you set me straight
You told me things
That heroes must make???
I'll do what you say
As long as you feel
And I can be had
Without sex appeal
I know something that you would never believe
I wish I was able to finally make you (agree).
It's times like this, Baby that makes it all seem worthwhile.
I'm lookin' for something that I can find in a smile
Now, you set me straight
You told me things
That heroes must make????
I'll do what you say
As long as you (feel)
(that) I can be had
Without sex appeal.
08 Sky Pup (03:50)
SKY PUP
Next time you gimme your gaze
Think about mork sinny goal
That tricky grass for me
Aw, T.V. you're in my nose
Oh, baby, baby, big red bally
Ain't it just a big ol' ball?
My baby, you're not crazy
Might be you're lone
*cough cough*
*choke*
Come on, gimme a drag
Bambino, see your diamond landing
Well baby, you're not so mean
Tell you like a horny nuclear
This damn baby, she wants my skillo
Hawk sooner I'm a witness
You like, like...hog
Lazy bread in your cocktail
Kurt mazy you're not bad
My only dude you are my best friend
She's cat damned
Damn, damned easy
My head's a big smile
10 Teet (02:51)
TEET
I've seen a friend go ride you host away the peel
My leavin bedroom for my carvin wheel
Joke Mister join the Navy ain't so sad in awe
Half of the jay gone century cat the call
Toast no indee gone aim no want to be a ray
She's not afraid to fear more chaste with me
Ask not and you won't find it ride
Actin like over gentry
Maybe you're in hair
Ace like a big and hairy happy sad
Toast no indee gone aim no want to be a ray
She's not afraid to fear more chaste with me
Ask not and you won't find it ride
12 Pearl Bomb (02:45)
PEARL BOMB
Croak radio gives me the shakes. That's no surprise
Cuz I can feel both barrels of your eyes. Understand
what I'm sayin just like a hole beat red. You think
I'm bine. You take a leg. You feel a nice teen tone
bime-b-b-bye. Left dog. See big, boy, after your
dirty little tee bits all in seein my meat. I took a
team of you. Your bo-dy. For left-ov-er your sane.
Green water like a sugarback I bet your bine. Read
both bladder steps of foamy decline. Limbo. Lacky.
Sucker. Yes her limbo baba's at home and they cry
like half-dead dog bug.
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By Mr.Moustache
The Melvins: the epitome of homemade doom.
Kurt Cobain contributes drums on 'Spread Eagle Beagle', his first instrument.
