Author: Sandi Sadar Šoba
Artist: Jane's Addiction
Label: Capitol Records
Release: 2011
Length: 40:01
Rating: 5/5
They’re volatile, unpredictable ego-trippers, and in their turbulent years of existence, going all the way back to 1985, the band has been through countless upheavals, lineup swaps, functional breakdowns and breakups. You can call them weirdos, ex-junkies, kitsch-drenched posers, but you can’t deny the significance, the greatness and the glitz they brought into the musical universe as far back as 1991. You also have to admit there’s something magnetic about the name and the sweet intoxication they serve up. You can barely resist it, and sooner or later you have to confess you’ve got hooked. If in 1988 Nothing’s Shocking, despite its title, was a real shock to the system, with its added value confirmed by the innovative follow-up Ritual De Lo Habitual, then eight years ago Strays, and in the year of our Lord 2011 the work of art that crowns it all as a four-piece with balls and soul, the album The Great Escape Artist, make it instantly clear that the number of albums is hardly something you can count or list among the key traits of this legendary band from the city of fallen angels.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NqInDWgEMwk
Even though quite a while has passed since the last artistic discourse of glamorous production, beautiful songs and unforgettable gigs, the review of this fourth, so unconventionally conventional record has to kick off with a side note that will calm the skeptics and ease the stress that way too many musicians have dished out to us this year with their leaps into the unknown. Yes, it was worth the wait, and no, The Great Escape Artist is not a shot in the dark. In fact, considering that besides the once heavily stoned trio it was also engineered by the TV and radio multi-instrumentalist and oddball Dave Sitek, the record is still damn faithful to what you could, by definition, call the Jane’s Addiction sound. What used to be forces of discord, destruction and unpredictability has, over long years of leaving and coming back, turned into a well-oiled monolithic machine that charms and carries a hefty pair of heavyweight balls and character. Or, to borrow the words of the band’s mastermind, dad and mum in one person, mad genius and artistic visionary of the addictive Jane’s: “We’ve become a big business and a big thing that gives birth to new galaxies!”
The shift from the first live-in-the-studio record Jane’s Addiction to today is in the thickness of the sound, the fat production and a more articulate stance, in which the basic language of communication is like the most passionate, sweaty love outpouring of primal instinct and ominous otherworldliness. Perry Farrell is an uncommon oddball, if we wanted to be superficial, and on top of his distinctive thin voice he has a team of talented, versatile musical shamans at his side. On guitar he’s loyally backed by guitar wizard and alternative media icon Dave Navarro. Behind the drums sits one of the best drummers, at least as far as alternative rock goes, Stephen Perkins, and they had more than a lucky hand finding a replacement for the talented bassist Eric Avery. Through a string of coincidences fate briefly brought Duff McKagan and Dave Sitek their way, and now the four strings are tamed by Chris Chaney, former bassist of Alanis Morissette’s touring band, Methods Of Mayhem, Jack’s Mannequin and Slash. The dual source of darkness and light, the eternal yin and yang, is trapped in a little bottle, where the constant danger of blowing them up and flinging them over the edges of the universe shakes hands with solid, juicy, lustful rock, perfect for a sensual, wild striptease.
The Great Escape Artist is the logical follow-up to Strays, a dark record marked by the burdens of a destructive past, as the opening track Underground proves right away, offering all the ingredients for success: tasty arrangements, good guitars and a honed point to it all: “I try to get some love from up high / There just ain’t enough to go around / Someone had to pay up for the wakes / Taking place downi in the underground”. The Great Escape Artis puts the compatibility of the incompatible front and center. Wide-open elusiveness and megalomaniacal sonic ease intertwine with metallically tough yet playful metal guitars, while the ethereal underpinning of the aforementioned songs from Strays gets some upgrades. The bass rumbles like there’s a bet riding on it, and the unconventional sonic backdrop of the track End Of The Lies is rounded out by the traditional Japanese musicians Joujouka. The opening imperative is screaming and pompously loud and, as if sneaking in from the vocabulary used on the exceptional Ritual De Lo Habitual, builds on post-apocalyptic tension and ambience. There’s a balladic touch that’s more than a ballad, indefinably dense and always present. And curiosity, despite the fact that too much curiosity can kill, leads on to the big moment of the record and its first announced single, the track Irresistible Force, which builds rich impressions on the minimalism of grandiose, narcotic explosiveness. Jane’s Addiction prove they feel best in their uncommonly colored skin, in which they can impulsively sing about passion, sex, lovemaking, burning out and their own greatness, built with pretentious moves and fractal visions of a fairly warped yet strikingly present-day time, which can nonetheless be attractive, beautiful and intoxicating, even if the backdrop of stale nothingness is lit only by a sea of neon.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yahYO09XXPU
And in the direction of catchiness that burrows deep under the skin, the record carries on with its stampede of ten-ton blows wrapped in fluffy, softly padded choruses, a prime example being the sweet and tasty I’ll Hit You Back. Even threats of physical contact, settling scores and violence can sound sexy and melancholically tender. Melodrama threads through the seams of the album like a gorgeous filler or pink icing. “Told you white lies / I used white magic / I need you to know / I’m not a reject / I’ve been committed-but / not for a long time / long over that and / you can believe it / Ooh sometimes I got lucky-I / I got nailed too / real good… / she / she was way over my head / couldn’t help myself / hid my past from you / To fit in / to fit in to / ooh and yes get in bed with you / I had to / have a way of / telling tales / somewhat twisted” creeps into your ears sinfully beautiful, like the narration of an apocalyptic faun and satyr, which Farrell somehow is. And that faun likes to hold a mirror up in front of himself, reflecting a rich helping of his sarcasm, cynicism and unruly rebelliousness into our souls. The songs are autobiographical moments, miniatures that encapsulate the sentiments washing over him as he revives memories of the past. Splash A Little Water On It reaches out in a slightly dreamy way to the dreamy delusions of the recent past, when the bohemian soul sought completion in smoke and alcohol fumes, and right there lie the fragments of the great escape artist, the master of evasion whom Farrell paints as the album’s protagonist presented to the public.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0XuOmH0so20
Among the less usual pieces on the record is the lament Broken People, dedicated to the tragedy of a female protagonist, whom they don’t brand with their usual images of junkies and eccentrics, but instead give her a dignified chance to introduce herself through the portrait of a young, used-up porn actress. And instead of sensationally, pompously caricaturing the fairly two-dimensional plight of a nameless girl, in the manner of Porno For Pyros, they usher her into the world of pain with elegance and a peculiar compassion. And after McKagan’s brilliant explosion of forms, with which Jane’s Addiction can sound as manly and punchy as the glam kings of rebellion Guns’N’Roses, with the track Words Right Out Of My Mouth, this time’s story is told and the last cup of truth drained in one gulp. After the final fade of angry chords, guitar screams and melancholic guttural falsetto, the curtains come down for good, and we hope to live to see a worthy follow-up in a few years, one more story and at least 40 minutes of new music.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gMFlOBpci4k
The Great Escape Artist is a musical story with wonderful paintings, and at the same time this musical fairytale world glorifies the aesthetics of the ugly, the unconventional and therefore the astonishing. Jane’s Addiction are masters at painting this kind of eccentric landscape, while slipping away from any definition in their own way. No story is ever cemented for good and no tie to this world is too strong to keep you from drifting off into the realms of astral bodies, apparitions and angels. Intoxication is a must and a musical disconnect is imperative for adjusting to a different aesthetic, one that does this world no injustice. Realism grows into surrealism, and Dalí’s paintings of melting time are just a pure coincidence, one that lets us, at least for a moment, by listening to tales about others, forget our own troubles and escape our so spatially and temporally defined bodies, and we can thank Jane’s Addiction for that too.
Lineup
• Perry Farrell – vocals
• Dave Navarro – lead and rhythm guitar, keyboards (1, 3, 5-10)
• Stephen Perkins – drums, percussion
• David Andrew Sitek – bass (1-6, 8-10), keyboards (1, 3 5, 6-9), programming (1, 3, 5-10), rhythm guitar (2-4, 6, 8, 9)
• Chris Chaney – bass
Guest musicians:
• Master Musicians of Jonjouka – rhaita and additional percussion (2)
• John Hill – additional keyboards (4-6)
• Jamie Muhoberac – additional keyboards (8)
Production
Rich Costey & Perry Farrell
Tracklist
1. Underground
2. End To The Lies
3. Curiosity Kills
4. Irresistible Force (Met The Immovable Object)
5. I’ll Hit You Back
6. Twisted Tales
7. Ultimate Reason
8. Splash A Little Water On It
9. Broken People
10. Words Right Out Of My Mouth
