Revisit:
Mr. Bungle
California
1999
Revisit is a series of reviews highlighting past releases that now deserve a second look.
Like all Mr. Bungle albums, California is an oddity; a freak of musical nature; a brainchild with a severe case of autism. Yet, like its predecessors, Mr. Bungle’s final album beats to its own drum. The band’s eponymous debut album made it clear: they were put on Earth to indulge their audiences in the excessively weird. Absolutely unprecedented, the album’s ten tracks of utterly demented circus-metal was a test of even the most die-hard experimental rock fan’s patience. The songs shifted tempos, melodies and beats as if the band was making commission from it. Then, Mr. Bungle released Disco Volante in late 1995, an album where all hell broke loose. Like a schizophrenic off his meds, Disco Volante’s tunes twisted in directions faster than an Ingmar Berman film. The band accomplished seemingly impossible tasks of surfing through fragments of genres within just a few measures. Everything from lounge, doo-wop, free jazz, trance, Halloween music, hardcore punk and beyond was sucked into Mr. Bungle’s vortex. At times, Disco Volante’s songs almost sounded like a regurgitated hodgepodge of samples strewn randomly together. In the end, all of it cemented Mr. Bungle’s mad genius.
California’s release nearly four years later caught us all off guard. From the get-go, the album strikes a different mood with the acoustic, lounge-y, tropical “Sweet Charity.” Those expecting the band to outdo Disco Volante’s insanity were given little hope after this lush, pop-ridden opener. Sure, “Sweet Charity” has its own brief, unexpected jumps into other genres and arrangements, but as a whole, the song is…well, a song. Most prominently, it’s cohesive – a notion Mr. Bungle had apparently been avoiding on their first two albums. The majority of California follows the cool, mellow groundwork “Sweet Charity” lays down – “Retrovertigo,” “Pink Cigarette,” “The Holy Filament,” “Vanity Fair,” et al being the melody-rich examples. These songs commemorate Mr. Bungle’s bizarre nature through more subtle avenues, like their underlying humor and singer Mike Patton’s (also of Faith No More) extreme vocal versatility. He squeaks and growls, he bellows like an opera singer, he harmonizes like the Beach Boys and can even do it all in convincing foreign accents.
But the real treats found within California are its other non-linear offerings, which recall the absurdity and unpredictability of Disco Volante. The most prolific and compositional of this bunch is the rompy “None of Them Knew They Were Robots.” The track packs more swing and rockabilly than a Brian Setzer Orchestra overdose. In the midst of this, Patton and his bandmates weave in and out of moods and genres every 10 to 20 seconds, utilizing their backup band to extreme effect; every imaginable orchestra instrument makes a cameo at some point during “Robots,” and they all tie cleanly and with purpose into the bizarre composition. Patton skit-scats gibberish and doo-wops as much as he howls like a Vegas rockabilly singer. No wonder he was widely regarded as one of the best vocalists of the ’90s.
The album’s most bizarre number is “Ars Moriendi,” the purest descendent of Disco Volante’s madness. If you ever wanted to hear what Middle Eastern polka music sounds like when peppered in with trance beats and death metal, well here it is. “Ars Moriendi” is the quintessential soundtrack for a Road Runner cartoon on acid. The song is utterly hilarious, but also packs some of California’s best moments and eeriest lyrics. Herein lies California’s alluring quality: Patton & Co. have set limits for themselves. “Ars Moriendi,” like California, is a concise, graspable piece rather than an alienating experience. Mr. Bungle has refined its music into something ultimately better without sucking the fun out of itself. Hell, the band sounds like it’s almost having too much fun to take itself seriously when Patton sings, “I shall rise again/ Bardo of the flesh/ So feast on me/ All my bones are laughing/ As you’re dancing on my grave.”
And that was the whole point of Mr. Bungle: to have a good time. Unlike any other band out there with the same goal, they did it by shattering the possibilities of music’s broad potential. As an entity, Mr. Bungle was a prodigy, and California was their gate-way drug, their accessible, tangible proof that they didn’t have to be musically esoteric. Given the album’s bizarreness and intricacy, what were the odds that it’d be simultaneously appreciated and enjoyed by the casual listener? The correct term might be miracle.
by Jory Spadea
