UNDER THE HOOD Clutch
May 11, 2011
The newly invigorated veteran Maryland hard rock merchants revisit a 2004 classic as a deluxe two-disc set.
BY REV. KEITH A. GORDON
Clutch has been banging around on the fringes of the hard rock and heavy metal realms for two decades now, achieving a certain notoriety and a modicum of success. Formed in 1991, the Maryland band attracted major label attention due to the buzz surrounding their jammy, intense live performances. Clutch would spend much of the decade of the 1990s bouncing back and forth between labels, all of which tried in vain to get lead madman Neil Fallon and the band to adhere to some sort of (commercially-viable) alt-nu-metal aesthetic, like those good boys in Korn or Incubus.
Truth is, whether you consider him a madman or a genius, or maybe a little of both, Fallon and his band of merry pranksters have always been a square peg resisting placement into any sort of round hole. Through the years, Clutch has earned begrudging respect from metal fanboys and savvy, clued-in hard rock hipsters alike by pursuing an eclectic musical vision that includes slippery, groove-laden metallic funk (not unlike Faith No More); slow-drone doom (think Sabbath, or maybe contemporaries Kyuss); 1970s-era "classic" rock; and ramshackle electric blues (years before Jack White got his stripes).
By 2004, though, after better than a decade spent hanging around the lower rungs of the major label machine, Clutch went the indie route and signed with DRT Records, a label founded by former Gentle Giant member Derek Shulman. The artist-friendly label seemed like a good fit, and with like-minded fellow travelers such as Fu Manchu calling DRT home, the original line-up of Clutch - vocalist/guitarist Fallon, guitarist Tim Sult, bassist Dan Maines, and drummer Jean-Paul Gaster - made themselves comfortable and recorded what many consider the band's best album, Blast Tyrant. Out-of-print these past few years, Clutch has reissued Blast Tyrant as a deluxe, two-disc set on the band's own brand-spankin'-new label Weathermaker Records. (Ed. note: For details on Clutch's ill-fated tenure with DRT, read our interview with Fallon, published this past January.)
What makes Blast Tyrant so beguiling is the reckless abandon of the band's performances. The album opens with, well, a blast of sound and fury in "Mercury," Fallon's splintered guitarplay evoking both Tony Iommi and Ritchie Blackmore with a blistering intro that is chaotic and pure blinding white light before the singer's growling, menacing vocals kick in above a slingshot rhythm, the song's brief mythological-based lyrics flashing by in a heartbeat before the song devolves into pure electronic buzz.
"Profits Of Doom" is a more traditional heavy metal song, sounding slightly like Ted Nugent's "Great White Buffalo" around the edges, Fallon's beard-puller vocals wrapped around lyrics that read like a Biblical tempest. As the swirl of clashing guitar, bass, and galloping drumbeats swells ever greater behind him, Fallon's voice rises and falls in tandem like a Primitive Baptist preacher slinging fire and brimstone at the heathens at some backwoods Mississippi tent revival. As the song reaches an unsustainable fervor, it breaks down into pure glossolalia, Fallon spitting lyrics about "John the revelator" and how you should never "trust the white man driving the black van, he's just saving all his voodoo for you" in what seems to be a lyrical damning of the Pharisees of modern finance.
Not that "The Mob Goes Wild" is any less frenetic, starting out with a nonsensical rap by Fallon about his pants and some dance before the song launches into what seems to be an anti-war rant delivered above a guitar-driven, fierce-as-a-rabid-wolverine soundtrack that runs like a runaway train fast, fast, fast through your consciousness as suddenly the singer recommends that we all move to Canada and smoke "lots of pot" and proposes that we "bum rush the border guard before he and his dog ever knew it." The insanity spirals out of control, ending with amplifier buzz and ear-ringing drumbeats. "Cypress Grove" is a bit of malevolent Southern-fried funk, the song's redneck tale warning of seriously mean women and dangerous games, referencing both Ronnie James Dio and bluesman Bukka White, perhaps, as Fallon and Sult's twin-guitar thuggery bruises and beats you into submission.
Whew...just when you think that Clutch couldn't deliver anything more maddening with Blast Tyrant, you discover that they were just warming up, getting us ready, you see, for the radioactive activity to follow the nearly-perfect first four tracks. The lyrics of "Promoter (of earthbound causes)" sound like something from the mouth of Norse myth's evil trickster Loki, the song bouncing from ancient Egypt to Ragnarok (the Viking apocalypse), playing like some sort of acid-etched fever-dream, the protagonist stating "A little bit of Ritalin goes a long way" and that he's "ready to rock if you wanna roll." You can bet that heads are gonna roll before this trip is over, Fallon and crew grooving on a rock-rap trip reminiscent of Kid Rock but with a lysergic fountain of youth at their left hand, the entire emotional anguish of the words not coming to any conclusion but sounding so cool as the song tilts out of control.
By contrast, the metallic-blues of "The Regulator" hearken back to the Mississippi Delta, sliding in on the wings of a finely-strummed acoustic intro that is soon joined by swirling psychedelic electric. Fallon's slightly off-register vocals display a gospel fervor as they rise with the instrument's amplification, foreshadowing the band's great 2007 blues album From Beale Street To Oblivion. Pounding out a muscular riff and featuring the band's now-trademark smothering instrumentation, "The Regulator" seems to be some sort of morality play, but it's hard to tell for sure, the song ending with a pleading "how many times have I prayed that the angels would speed me away?" above a suddenly-changing, Faith No More-styled electric funk conclusion.
And thus rolls Blast Tyrant, Fallon's individually oblique lyrical vision applied to the band's increasingly and delightfully noisy, metal-edged, funky, and fleet-footed surrealistic musical landscape. "Worm Juice" seems to be about some sort of hallucinogenic liquor, "Army of Bono" gleefully skewers politics and celebrity by satirizing everybody's favorite bonehead Irish rock star; I know who it is, and you too. The muscle-bound "Spleen Merchant" is a riffy rocker with more mind-bending lyrics and a guitar squeal that would have made Jimi move over while "Ghost" toasts the dearly departed, Fallon once again calling up an Old Testament fury while death stalks us all in the form of the syncopated rhythms and elegant acoustic fretwork. The instrumental "WYSIWYG" closes out Blast Tyrant with classic rock dignity, the bleating bass-n-drums framework complimented by Gaster's broken-glass cymbal crashes and shards of jagged guitar.
The bonus disc provided this reissue of Blast Tyrant is called "Basket of Eggs," an odds 'n' sods collection of demos and acoustic alternate takes that often move in an entirely different direction from the main album. "Box Car Shorty's Confession" is a rollicking blues number with scraps of spry harpwork and a storyline fitting of Leadbelly or Skip James. An acoustic version of "The Regulator" frames the song in a somewhat different light, adding a little more mud and grit to the original's Delta influence, slowing it down to a mean-spirited crawl. "Tight Like That" is another dark, bluesy acoustic bonfire with gruff, almost spoken-word vocals and "Drink to the Dead" combines a jazzy undercurrent with a shuffling beat and muted vocals to great effect. Of the demo tracks, "Cattle Car" stands out for its unabashed use of cowbell, its undeniable infectious circular riffs, and its blustery vocals while "Steve Doocy" provides a not-so-subtle commentary on Fox news morality above a bed of screaming guitars and scraping rhythms.
Clutch was, and is, a creative entity entirely its own, painting with a palette of the band's unique creation. Blast Tyrant successfully blends 1970s-inspired hard rock with heavy metal, blues, jazz, and 1990s-styled alt-metal influences, throws in a jam band's love of lengthy improvisation and literate, sometimes absurdist, and frequently incoherent lyrics. Neil Fallon makes you work for your pleasure, and there's no doubt that this can be challenging music to wrap your brain around. The destination is worth the sojourn, however, Blast Tyrant displaying the band's one-of-a-kind vision with white light clarity.
Clutch kicks off an east coast tour May 20 and then a Midwest tour in July (with opening act Corrosion of Conformity). Tour dates at their official website.
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