Music Banter - Mr. Bungle? Meshuggah? Avant-Garde Metal!

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- - Mr. Bungle? Meshuggah? Avant-Garde Metal! (https://www.musicbanter.com/rock-metal/38380-mr-bungle-meshuggah-avant-garde-metal.html)

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Originally Posted by mojopinuk (Post 614940)

A few of my mates with similar music tastes love Voivod too. I've just never been able to get away with Nothingface. I may check out some of their earlier output sometime anyway as I know Nothingface was their fifth record and rarely do I not start from the beginning of bands discographies. I keep trying it again every now and then hoping its just a grower but so far no such joy.

Dimension Hatross is your next best bet then. Their first album is not great at all!

Cool cheers! I may get round to that at some point.

Anyone here listen to Today Is The Day? I'd say they definitely fit in the Avant-Garde Metal category. For me they're one of those bands that I like more in theory than in execution. I have Sadness Will Prevail by them and I have to admit I rarely listen to it. I always think I'll enjoy it so I throw it on and then remember that I don't like the guy's voice and the production kind of bothers me. If anyone on here is a fan of them and thinks there's another album by them that I should give a listen I'd be more than happy to check it out though.

Also don't forget Sleepytime Gorilla Museum and Abruptum.

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Originally Posted by jackhammer (Post 614929)

If you can't get on with nothing face then I would doubt if you could get into anything else. I love Voivod personally and have done for years.

While I won't pretend I'm a huge fan of theirs I have Killing Technology and I enjoy it immensely. Even if the vocals are a little off putting at first the rhythm section is challenging enough to keep the music intriguing.

The vocals have a lot to do with my inability to get into them. I havent heard that record though.

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Originally Posted by mr dave (Post 613938)

i guess i'll be the first to say something about bungle besides OMG! BUNGLE!!!

mr. bungle is great and all but i really don't get how so many people classify them as any kind of metal. i suppose if you only listened to their demos and first album and skipped most of the 2nd you could but by the time the band was done they were very much their own style. the band proved this without any shadow of a doubt on 'california'.

i find that the bulk of bands who name drop bungle generally 'try' rehashing the apparent chaos of 'disco volante' without ever seeming to be capable of writing a complete song in just one style. that's what really set bungle apart for me, they were capable of pulling from all sorts of styles at the drop of a hat, AND they were also able to stick to one style for the duration of a whole song. a track like 'sweet charity' doesn't need a big metal breakdown in the middle for example.

i've yet to hear a bungle baby take that step, all i hear is a bunch of bits and pieces of stuff thrown together without any evidence there was anything else to the selections. conversely, most of the time those musical mosaics come across as glued together, there's no underlying sensation of the chaos just happening. it's calculated and at that point, no longer chaotic. i get the impression that more often than not the multitude of styles in most of the followers becomes more of a musical masturbatory measuring stick than anything necessary to propagate the musical piece.

A well-written and thoughtful post. I confess I don't have much patience for Mr. Bungle because by the time that I listened to Disco Volante I already had the misfortune of running across California, which I absolutely hate through and through; it forcibly reminded me of the latter years of FNM and everything that they turned into.

There ARE others like Mr. Bungle though. A clone through most of their work Dog Fashion Disco always caught the inevitable comparison to Mr. Bungle. It was only until their last album Adultery that they really put their songwriting shoes on, but I will swear by it until the day they cart me off to the nursing home that it is an awesome fucking record. Of course Todd Smith went off and started some new shit two man project but I will always have this to comfort me when things feel a little too normal.

Here's a review I wrote a little while ago...

http://www.musicbanter.com/album-rev...-adultery.html

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Originally Posted by lucifer_sam (Post 615167)

Damn man, California is my favorite Bungle album. I first got into Mr. Bungle with their self-titled album. I loved that one but honestly I was a little let down by Disco Volante. Don't get me wrong, I liked the fact that Disco Volante was weirder and more experimental than its predecessor but some of it has always felt a little too much like them just farting around. After that I fully expected their next album to be even stranger but lo and behold they surprised the hell out of me with California which is basically their take on a pop album. I think I was little taken aback the first time I heard it but it quickly became my favorite.

Dog Fashion Disco, and Shaolin Death Squad are my two favourite Patton-worshipping bands, with SDS taking the lead due to their vastly superior song-writing skills.

But the expiremental/avant-garde scene certainly is something I have gotten into.

Melt Banana, the Boredoms, Diablo Swing Orchestra, Behold...the Arctopus, Sir Davinda ****alot and Sleepytime Gorilla Museum are the ones with which I am most familiar.

Other projects, like Boris, Merzbow, Sunn0))) and so on have been floating around the edges of my awareness for the last little while.

Quote:

Originally Posted by lucifer_sam (Post 615167)

we're going to have to agree to disagree but where you present valid reasons for your opinions i don't think it's going to be an issue. then again i'm torn between 'angel dust' and 'album of the year' when it comes to FNM.

like janzoon i prefer 'California' over everything else released by bungle. i don't see it as so much of a pop album but their chaos was applied to a different level. with DV the chaos is applied to each song, you never know where they're going or how long they're going for.

on the other hand California's tracks are more refined and cohesive but you never know what the next one is going to be like. when you look at the album as a whole the collection of its songs shows the chaos of the band at work.

i don't mind clones and worshippers but ultimately they sound weak to my ears since they're forever trying to sound like someone else and never actually doing their own thing.