New Double Album: A Walk With Love and Death

[(PAUL)]

So which one are people going to listen to first, Love or Death?

[glen]

Yeah, one disc is all songs, as much as you can call them songs, and the second one is definitely way more experimental. Like a soundtrack, which'll have a movie that goes along with the soundtrack rather than a soundtrack that goes along with the movie."

yeah but I want ear punishment with a beat.          I expect the noise album to be ambient.


starting with the Big Biz collab they've gone down a more accessible road.     unfortunately your average every day MELVINS fan is not looking for accessibility.    I'm not picking on or finding fault with anything.    I'm just observing. 

[Jozzy]

Yeah, one disc is all songs, as much as you can call them songs, and the second one is definitely way more experimental. Like a soundtrack, which'll have a movie that goes along with the soundtrack rather than a soundtrack that goes along with the movie."

yeah but I want ear punishment with a beat.          I expect the noise album to be ambient.


starting with the Big Biz collab they've gone down a more accessible road.     unfortunately your average every day MELVINS fan is not looking for accessibility.    I'm not picking on or finding fault with anything.    I'm just observing.

Agreed. I want some Melvins of old, but I think those days are long gone. That being said, I still dig the hell out of most of everything they are still putting out.

[PepsiMike]

starting with the Big Biz collab they've gone down a more accessible road.   

True.

unfortunately your average every day MELVINS fan is not looking for accessibility. 

I think the opposite might be true.  Recent fans from the past five to ten years seem to love the poppier sounding Melvins.  If you'd said "older fans aren't looking for accessibility", I'd probably agree with you.

[benton netty]

I've heard the album.

The noise LP is just that. Much of it is just ambient sound (recordings of people talking or kids playing in the background) mixed with guitar freakouts and sci-fi noises. It's, sadly, almost totally pointless. "Give it to Me" is a 60's-style rave-up that's okay, because it's a band playing music, at least. The whole disc sounds like something the band could've farted out in an afternoon. What's the point of even doing this? "Prick" at least had "Larry."

The "rock" disc is...okay. Sadly, the ancient outtake "Euthanasia" is the best, heaviest tune. "Flaming Creature" is up there, too. First two tracks are moody numbers. A lot of it is kinda clean-tone, half-cocked stuff that just doesn't do it for me. It's just verse, verse, verse, out. These songs don't really go anywhere.

Your mileage may vary. I've felt like these guys are impressive for never becoming a bad band, ever, but I've also felt -- and this album really exemplifies this -- that they're coasting, and have been for some time. The Melvins used to blow my fucking mind every time around. Now, they land a couple punches here and there, but it's all very ephemeral.

Steve's bass playing is phenomenal, though. What a killer musician. Best player since Mark D.

[joelk]

I've heard the album.

The noise LP is just that. Much of it is just ambient sound (recordings of people talking or kids playing in the background) mixed with guitar freakouts and sci-fi noises. It's, sadly, almost totally pointless. "Give it to Me" is a 60's-style rave-up that's okay, because it's a band playing music, at least. The whole disc sounds like something the band could've farted out in an afternoon. What's the point of even doing this? "Prick" at least had "Larry."

The "rock" disc is...okay. Sadly, the ancient outtake "Euthanasia" is the best, heaviest tune. "Flaming Creature" is up there, too. First two tracks are moody numbers. A lot of it is kinda clean-tone, half-cocked stuff that just doesn't do it for me. It's just verse, verse, verse, out. These songs don't really go anywhere.

Your mileage may vary. I've felt like these guys are impressive for never becoming a bad band, ever, but I've also felt -- and this album really exemplifies this -- that they're coasting, and have been for some time. The Melvins used to blow my fucking mind every time around. Now, they land a couple punches here and there, but it's all very ephemeral.

Steve's bass playing is phenomenal, though. What a killer musician. Best player since Mark D.

This all sounds fair and accurate. I'm hoping that Melvins eventually have a late career kaboom where they release some mindblowers. But I am glad they are still at it and continue to rock harder than most contemporaries.

[black stallion]

Your mileage may vary. I've felt like these guys are impressive for never becoming a bad band, ever, but I've also felt -- and this album really exemplifies this -- that they're coasting, and have been for some time. The Melvins used to blow my fucking mind every time around. Now, they land a couple punches here and there, but it's all very ephemeral.

Steve's bass playing is phenomenal, though. What a killer musician. Best player since Mark D.

i agree pretty much on everything you said. huge amount of material they release doesn't help, just like production. still curious to hear this album and possibly change my opinion.

[Bigval]

Your mileage may vary. I've felt like these guys are impressive for never becoming a bad band, ever, but I've also felt -- and this album really exemplifies this -- that they're coasting, and have been for some time. The Melvins used to blow my fucking mind every time around. Now, they land a couple punches here and there, but it's all very ephemeral.

I think that's a fair statement that I agree with. IMO they've fallen into a bit of a trap of churning out album after album perhaps to keep getting tour offers from promoters rather than genuinely waiting until they have enough quality material, that's okay their choice they wouldn't make much off album sales they need to keep constantly touring.

However, the danger is the fans start losing interest with every sub par release I don't think it's coincidence that during this time their songs have for the most part become more straight ahead and accessible and Buzz keeps going with that clean mediocre guitar tone.

To me the rot started to set in with the last BB album TBSM and it's been slim pickings ever since. I loved the Bulls & Bees EP as it felt like genuinely creative material to me it doesn't even sound like modern day Melvins. But one thing that Three Men & A Baby album did for me last year was make me nostalgic for the old heavier crunchier Melvins.

[black stallion]

review

[DToxico]

Surprised to see people other than parenthesis-guy complaining about this one. Still really looking forward to it if only because I feel like I'm going to get more out of the ambient/industrial/noise half than a lot of people here are. People going "what's the point" must not be aware of Throbbing Gristle, their genre, and/or Buzz' fanboy status.

Are they really releasing stuff with more frequency than before? Other than the gap when Rutmanis fucked them, it seems like it's always been this way. But I do agree that they do seem to be doing some relatively samey stuff lately going for that younger audience and tour opportunities, and like others I wish Buzz would at least change his guitar tone.

[meezer]

Both new songs rule. The noize/ soundtrack side should be at least as good as the 4 songs on POTRE that I don't like so much and his guitar tone is great these days, studio and live. Very excited for this. 

[(the) Razor]

Can't help but think that some of the comments on here make a lot of sense. Still, if you don't like this album there's always Dale's solo which sounds incredible to my ears. Looking forward to that more so than the last few Melvin's releases

[deatheats]

https://www.artistdirectinterviews.com/rock/melvins-buzz-osborne-a-walk-with-love-and-death

Good interview!  Thanks!

[bUTTHOLEmAN]

Thanks N 

[surfling]

Your mileage may vary. I've felt like these guys are impressive for never becoming a bad band, ever, but I've also felt -- and this album really exemplifies this -- that they're coasting, and have been for some time. The Melvins used to blow my fucking mind every time around. Now, they land a couple punches here and there, but it's all very ephemeral.

really well put.
and i totally expect the band to turn around eventually and start writing more creative and experimental music again. i think it's inevitable that any creative person/group will run into a period of less inspiration that they will have to manage to get through with not too much harm done.... bowie comes to mind, or iggy, or neil young.

at least with melvins (as with neil young or iggy!) they were always and still are an incredible live band. i've yet to see a bad melvins show, and i must have seen a few dozen.