MIKE PATTON: FNM's new star
Chris Watts
Marquee, London
FAITH NO More are jumping on you from a very great height.
They're pushing out the ceiling and bringing down the walls and if you weren't there then you must be kind of dull. Faith No More were damn perfect. And to think we've been whinging about the loss of Chuck Moseley for so many months, worrying that Faith No More might be all More are ripping out faces No US/UK (You Suck, geddit?)
have an interesting deathwish.
Most people sit on the floor as the odd quartet gather to rape every known musical genre.
There are splashes of dumb Metal, cheeky pop and jerky rap.
Boasting a drummer with no drums and a homespun anthem for Wendy James, 'You've Got Nothing We Want, Wendy' ("for people wo buy records Dy bimbos..."), US/UK might just be sufficiently disposable to be celebrities. Ultimately Scat Opera do it all 1000 times better. Pah!
No one can dispute Faith No More's notorious riot of colour and noise. The first of two nights here and they re enjoying it every bit as much as me. For some it is an introduction, others because they're a buzz band on the front cover, but most are here because Faith No More fit like an old sock and make a mockery of King's X's bedroom art-rock boffin angst. Faith No More hang out Metal and funk to dry, wrap it up in a satellite groove and simply deliver the most exhausting turmoil of steaming eccentricity
Equal parts Jerry Garcia Krusher Joule and God, Big Sick Cuddly Ugly Jim Martin is proof Anita Flying is rapped low.
enormous gonzoid riffs adding colour to the tidal, tribal rhythms of Mike Bordin and Bill Gould.
Dreadlocked, smooth-chested Bordin loses his sticks in showers of sweat, beats his snare and never misses a beat as Faith No More hurtle precariously through three albums.
But it's Mike Patton who is Faith No More's new star. Like a dervish he spins, howling and stage-diving, dancing like a top and breathing new life into 'We Care A Lot'.
Unlike Moseley, Patton has a voice and lends Faith No More's accustomed frenzy a welcome touch of melody. As the stage-divers invade, Patton claws his way around the savage new roots of The Real Thing'.
'Surprise! You're Dead!' is spat out in pure Speedcore style, tagging deftly onto 'Epic and
'From Out Of Nowhere'. A compact, clipped 'We Care A Lot' judders on its heels, as always haunted by Roddy Bottum's keyboards.
The stage is weeping, the floor throbbing as Faith No More claim the instrumental encore of Woodpecker From Mars' as their own, rejoined by Patton for a totally convincing 'War Pigs'. A second encore is earned and the band are still up there to kill.
Faith No More are funny and touching, almighty and odd, brave and genius.
Complaints? Sure, the bastards stopped.
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