Melvins
Thunderball
Ipecac Records
Thunderball blasts forth with the three-minute headbanger King Of Rome and the kind of bombast we haven’t heard from Melvins for a while. This isn’t traditional Melvins, though; this is Melvins 1983 Buzz’s third return to the original Melvins lineup with drummer Mike Dillard; this time, they’re also augmented by electronic artists Void Manes and Ni Mâtres for gargling interludes and embellishments. These analogue abstractions draw us, via the wonderfully titled soundscape Vomit Of Clarity, into the third song, which is the epic Short Hair With A Wig, clocking in at eleven minutes. It broods with menace, circling you and eyeing you up like good food before Victory Of The Pyramids opens up into a sky-scraping, almost happy melody that turns on its heel to deliver the kind of food to the floor classic rock catharsis that instantly lodges itself in your head, such is the catchiness of these full-bodied tracks as soon as you get too comfortable tapping your finger on the wheel they turn again into a doomy mammoth beast Buzz Osbourne is in fine voice here and his primal wail is powerful and authoritative. Melvins were never going to make a safe album, and whilst this collection contains memorable hooks, it always keeps you guessing. Venus Blood is the climax to this awesome album, which skitters and swerves on anticipation and suspense before giving way to spaced-out synths and abruptly stopping.This is what Melvins have built a forty-two-year career on, though. They eternally keep you guessing, and we are here to be surprised and confounded. In our humble opinion, it is definitely up there with the best Melvins albums. Go and seek it out!
Review by George Miller