Melvins, The: Everybody Loves Sausages

They say confession is good for the soul, so here's one of mine: I never really got into The Melvins. Sure, I know their reputation and I readily recognize their overall importance; I just honestly never put them on any of my playlists. When I found out I could review Everybody Loves Sausages, I was excited and nervous. How could I possibly have anything to say about this legendary band?

My solution is this: keep it simple. I've been listening to Everybody Loves Sausages for several days now and I can honestly say that it's a lot of fun. Bands need to release an album of covers once in a while, not only so that fans can learn more about influential artists and songs but also so that they can understand how the band handles the material, how they adapt it to their sound. Sometimes the result of can be disastrous, a karaoke version of otherwise good songs. At other times, though, they can be lots of fun. Rush's cover album Feedback was a lot of fun, an example of what a major band can do with classic material.

With Everybody Loves Sausages The Melvins offer listeners a healthy and eclectic range of cover songs that serve as great tributes to wonderful songs. Many of the selections come from beloved work by classic bands—Queen, Venom, David Bowe, the Kinks—others come from generally lesser known bands. From beginning to end, though, things sound great and feel convincing, as though these songs always belonged together. I also appreciated the consistent sludge feel of the whole album. This is a Melvins album even though the music wasn't written by any of the band's members. The Melvins, though, have a distinctive voice and sound, one that comes from the slower-tempo punk sound made popular on side 2 of Black Flag's My War.

My only critique about this album is that some of the selections are quite long. I really liked "Station to tation" and "In Every Dream Home a Heartache," but they are both very long and occasionally a little too serious, especially in comparison to the shorter, exciting tracks like "Attitude" and "Female Trouble." Still, Jello Biafra's crazed vibrato on "In Every Dream Home a Heartache" was just about as perfect as it could be. This album makes for a satisfying listen and was more than enough to convince me to spend some money on the back catalogue of this superb band.

Track Listing:
1. Warhead
2. You're My Best Friend
3. Black Betty
4. Set it on Fire
5. Station to Station
6. Attitude
7. Female Trouble
8. Carpe Diem
9. Timothy Leary Lives
10. In Every Dream Home a Heartache
11. Romance
12. Art School
13. Heathen Earth

Added: June 13th 2013
Reviewer: Carl Sederholm
Score:
Related Link: Band Facebook Page
Hits: 1816
Language: english

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