The meeting of the Melvins and Fantomas is captured here on this concert DVD Live in London 2006 from the Kentish Town Forum. To say this is 60+ minutes of avant-garde music is a severe understatement. Considering the pedigree of all involved (Mike Patton, Dave Lombardo, Buzz Osborne, Trevor Dunn, Dale Crover and Dir David Scott Stone)you would expect something that's a bit off the wall...and that's exactly what you get. The set list contains tunes from the Fantomas Melvins Big Band album, plus select tunes from each bands' catalog, making for quite the night of mayhem. At times compelling, the band still manages to create a lot of, well, noise, too much so that this DVD will probably only be of interest to hardcore fans of either band, perhaps more so those into Fantomas, as the riff metal 'n' sludge style that is the Melvins is somewhat masked under the lunacy of Patton and his Captain Beefheart-ish take on overall weirdness. If you haven't followed the singer since he left Faith No More, don't expect a lot of singing here, as Patton delivers mostly screams, nonsensical warblings and gesticulations along with some noodly synth and samples. Wild haired Osborne lays down some guitar crunch throughout alongside Stone, and Slayer star Lombardo as always impresses mightily on the kit. It's hard to describe the chaos that is created here-it's not really metal, yet there are moments of massive heaviness, and there's just enough classical, prog, and jazz bits thrown into their mix of drone, sludge, extreme, and avant-garde that makes this whole event almost impossible to comprehend at times. Despite all that, you almost can't look away from your TV screen, the wall of noise just sucks you in, and Patton keeps you glued with his maniacal and demented performance.
There's a bonus audio commentary featuring a few members of the band, Ipecac Records co-owner Greg Werckman, booking agent Robby Fraser, and of all people, actor Danny DeVito. What DeVito is doing there is beyond me, but he adds some comedy to the whole commentary that makes for an intriguing listen.
So, if you are willing to take a strange and dangerous ride, strap yourself in and give this one a go.
Track Listing
1) sacrifice
2) page 27
3) night goat
4) page 28
5) page 3
6) electric long thin wire
7) the bit
8) page 14
9) pigs of the roman empire
10) the omen
11) hooch
12) mombius hibachi
13) page 23
14) skin horse
15) cape fear
16) let it all be
17) lowrider
18) 04/02/05 saturday
19) page 29
20) 04/08/05 friday
21) spider baby
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