Yeah, it was about time I gave Nu Metal a more thorough look at outside of my Korn material. What Hair Metal was to the 1980s, this take on Alternative Metal was to the 1990s. A unique blend of Thrash, Punk, Groove, Funk, and Rap/Hip-Hop, it was a commercial darling in that decade. Once it hit 2000, it’s popularity waned while more traditional sub-genres came back into the spotlight, yet it still had some disciples wandering around. While it’s not one of my absolute favorites, I find Nu Metal to be one of metal’s most unique sub-genres. Because of this, I’m devoting the entire summer of 2023 to this metallic style, and in a sense is kind of a sequel to the Summer of 90s festival I did last year. To start thing off, let’s take a look at the origins of Nu Metal with the bands that helped create the founding for this style to thrive, and I picked 3 that I think did so the best. So, let’s not waste anymore time, and check out my review for the first Faith No More album that Mike Patton appeared on. Let’s begin!
Background
Taken from Wikipedia:
“Faith No More underwent several line-up changes before releasing their first album, We Care a Lot, released in 1985 and distributed through San Francisco-based label Mordam Records. On the original vinyl release, the band is credited as "Faith. No More" on the album's liner notes, back cover, and on the record itself. Within a year the band signed up with Slash Records. The debut album's title track "We Care a Lot" was later re-recorded, for their follow-up album Introduce Yourself in 1987, and released as their first single. Membership remained stable until vocalist Chuck Mosley was replaced by Mike Patton in 1988.”
“The writing for the majority of the music for The Real Thing took place after the tour for Introduce Yourself. A demo version of "The Morning After", under the moniker "New Improved Song", with alternate lyrics written and sung by Chuck Mosley was released on the SoundsWaves 2 extended play with the Sounds magazine. "Surprise! You're Dead!" was composed by Jim Martin in the 1970s, while he was guitarist for Agents of Misfortune; Agents of Misfortune also featured Cliff Burton in their line up. The recording of the song took place in December 1988 after Chuck Mosley was fired from the band, and was completed prior to the hiring of Mike Patton, who then wrote all the lyrics for the songs, and recorded them the following month over the music.”
“Producer Matt Wallace said: “All the music was written before Mike joined the band, which had gotten rid of the original singer, Chuck Mosley, and the tracks were either in preproduction or being recorded when Mike came in. And when he'd ask if he could make a section longer or different, the band would say "No, this is it, so you have to do it this way". So Mike Patton wrote every lyric and melody to that record over a ten to twelve day period. And it is stunning, because he was nineteen or twenty, and pulled all that out of the air, and put together an incredible record. The only thing we did was spend a couple of days at this coffee shop in San Francisco, because a lot of the songs were really dark and heavy lyrically, crazily so, and I would sit there and go, "Mike, these are some great lyrics, but we need to at least use some metaphor, or couch some of the concepts, but I think you've got some great ideas here". In the end, they really pulled some great songs together.””
“The recording sessions yielded several songs that did not appear on the album. Two of them, "The Grade" and "The Cowboy Song", later appeared on the singles and on the UK edition of Live at the Brixton Academy. A third song, "Sweet Emotion", was later re-recorded with different lyrics as "The Perfect Crime" for the soundtrack to the film that also starred a cameo appearance from guitarist Jim Martin, Bill & Ted's Bogus Journey. The original version was released on Flexible Fiend 3 with Kerrang! magazine issue 258 and, more recently The Very Best Definitive Ultimate Greatest Hits Collection, the greatest hits compilation released to coincide with the band's reunion tour.”
The Real Thing would have massive success up it’s release, and is still considered to be a Heavy Metal classic. Despite being released in 1989, it actually wouldn’t get onto the Billboard 200 until February of 1990 after the release of the album’s second single (More on that in the “Best Track” section), and by October of 1990 would peak at no. 11 on the chart. The record would eventually go Platinum in both the United States & Canada, and be certified Silver in the United Kingdom. Reviews for it were also very good, with Jonathan Gold of the Los Angeles Times writing:
“Faith No More is a band with a punk-rock bassist, a classically trained keyboardist, a punk-funk singer and a drummer who would probably rather be playing Ghanaian tribal music, which goes a long way toward explaining the band's diversity. And, of course, there's heavy-metal Jim. Call what they do neo-metal.”
In his review for Stereogum in 2012, Tom Breihan said:
“The album gets a ton of credit and blame for helping to popularize rap-metal, but it was a lot more than that ... veered from quasi-Middle-Eastern orchestral churn ("Woodpecker From Mars") to dementedly creepy lounge-singer irony ("Edge Of The World") to all-out blitzkrieg ("Surprise! You're Dead"), but the whole thing felt cohesive because the band remained in a thunderous groove throughout and because they always tossed in triumphant hooks like the synth-line on "Falling To Pieces.”
In 2015 The Real Thing would be remastered & re-released, and many sources gave it a retrospective review. Brandon Geist of Rolling Stone Magazine wrote that it was then "considered to be an alterna-metal classic", Stuart Berman of the website Pitchfork said it had a "reputation as an alt-rock trailblazer" and "connection to a long-past funk-metal zeitgeist", going on to state that the album track "Epic" "was perfectly timed to satiate the then-burgeoning appetite for rap-rock". Finally, Ian Gittins wrote in their book The Periodic Table of Heavy Rock:
“when Mike Patton replaced [Chuck Mosley] ... FNM had all the standard hard-rock assault weapons of seizure-like rhythms, chugging guitar detonations and seismic drumming in their arsenal, but accessorized them with wildly eclectic influences from hip hop to synth pop and a brutally sarcastic sense of black humour.”
Basic Description
Experimental Fun
Sure, it was released in 1989, but The Real Thing has all of the heart & soul of the experimental zeitgeist of the 1990s. Sure, there’s Heavy Metal guitars, bass, and drums......but there’s so much more going on. I’ll be repeating this in the next section, but there’s 70s style funk & groove, smooth rhythms, soul, and even Rap/Hip-Hop like singing in some of the tracks (Again, I’ll be repeating that in a moment). It’s this experimentation & willingness to take a risk to try something new that allowed Heavy Metal to survive in the 1990s despite not being in the spotlight as heavily as it was in the 80s. Not only that, but it was this unique mix of musical elements that would help form Nu Metal just a few short years later......but they weren’t the only band to help make it.
Best Track
I think even people who aren’t Faith No More fans, or even Heavy Metal fans, might be familiar with Epic. It had all of the standard Heavy Metal troupes, but there’s so much more going on at the same time! You had Funky beats, you had soulful & trippy groove, and there was a piano sequence at the end (Which isn’t as unique as the other aspects) that felt oddly tragic. Even Mike Patton’s singing was special, as it almost comes across like he’s rapping more than singing like a full-blown metal guy. It’s this unique mix of things that makes Epic stand out, and considering that all of the tracks on The Real Thing are like this.....is saying something.
Epic
Worst Track
As much fun as The Real Thing is, my only complaint lies with the length of the tracks. Well, more like the perceived length. Most tracks are only 3 to 5 minutes when it comes to their runtime, and only the title track is of any significant length (8 minutes & 13 seconds). I don’t know what it is, but the tunes that are 5 to 8 minutes for whatever reason feel like double that amount of time. Again, nothing on here is bad, but every once in a while some songs can unintentionally feel like a slog.
Other
If you’re curious about listening to this album, then click on the link below:
The Real Thing
(Note: this link includedes the bonus tracks & 2015 release. I only looked at the very original tracklist for this review.)
Overall Impression & Rating
The Real Thing was definitely a sign of what was going to come in the 1990s. Firmly rooted in Heavy Metal, Faith No More mixed so many new & different things into the batter, and the end result that came out of the oven was nothing short of unique. There is a little bit of perceived self-indulgence & ego in places, but that doesn’t ruin the overall experience in any way. If you’d like to listen to an album that was a gateway into a different time, then The Real Thing should be the first one you try out.
The Real Thing gets a 9 out of 10.
And that was my review of The Real Thing. The first release of Faith No More’s library with Mike Patton, it presented all sorts of opportunities for the band as time went on. Even 30+ years after it’s release, it still has plenty of fans singing it’s praises. So, join me in a week or two when we’ll look at another source of inspiration for Nu Metal.....and one from a band that I’ve never looked at until now. See you soon!
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