In February, it was announced that Faith No More would be reuniting for some shows in Europe. Unlike most people that loved that band as much as I did, I was immediately disappointed. And not because I don’t live in Europe.
When a band breaks up, there’s a part of me that respects the finality, and I revere the samurai code of accepting fate with dignity. It bothered me when the surviving members of Guns N’ Roses started a band called Velvet Revolver. It bothered me when surviving members of Rage Against The Machine and Soundgarden started a band called Audioslave- not that I kept myself from appreciating the music on silly principle- but I lose a little bit of respect for an artist when they can’t let go of the past and move on to something truly new. Billy Corgan doesn’t have the patience to re-build a new career from scratch, so after prematurely losing interest in several less-successful projects, he dug up the body of the Smashing Pumpkins and took it out on the road. Scott Weiland did the same thing, and now Gavin Rossdale is getting Bush back together. Alice In Chains is touring without Layne. By the way, I will not be seeing Blind Melon or Sublime anytime soon.
Mike Patton has always been one artist who, very obviously to me, never let success, or lack thereof, sway his artistic decisions. Hell, at the height of Faith No More’s worldwide domination, one of the biggest sources of friction was Patton’s dedication to Mr. Bungle- a far less lucrative enterprise, but one that he was inflexibly, artistically passionate about.
In the years since, Patton has explored more projects than Slash, Cornell, Corgan, Weiland and Rossdale combined, but they’ve all proved to be long-term commitments, none of which he’s abandoned. You never got the impression that he was ever comparing anything to Faith No More, and when the salad days would come up in interviews, he’d occasionally candidly admit they were good times, but he never took the notion of trying to rehash them very seriously.
There’s a legendary story from 2002. Patton was playing a show at the Astoria in London with Tomahawk, and before the gig, a big meeting was set up. It turned out to be a nü-metal intervention of sorts. Chino Moreno, Brandon Boyd, Fred Durst, Coby Dickface from Papa Roach, Joey Jordison from Slipknot, Gavin Rossdale, and Billy Gould were all there. They had a multi-million dollar offer for Faith No More to reunite and tour. We won’t know exactly what immediately transpired until we interview one of those guys, but what we do know is that at some point, Patton stormed out, complaining to a bandmate about a drunk and unreasonable Moreno, among other things. An Astoria security guard with big nü-metal balls attempted to intervene, telling Patton to get “his skinny little ass back in the meeting and make it happen.”
Later that night, Patton pulled his dick out onstage, and urinated all over that security guard. At least that’s what the witnesses said. Upon being arrested backstage, Patton revealed a fake penis filled with water.
But the point had been made.
Faith No More was an amazing band, massively influential to every band represented in that meeting obviously, and to every spin-off and wannabe Godsmack and Disturbed clone of a clone to land a record deal in the late 90s / early 00s as well. But Patton wanted no part in that legacy. In an interview with Metal Hammer shortly after that meeting, Patton was quoted as saying, “Nü-metal makes my stomach turn. Don’t blame that shit on us, blame it on their mothers! Do you think I listen to any of that stuff at all? No, it’s for 13-year-old morons! Believe me, we’ll all be laughing about nü-metal in a couple of years. Heck, I’m actually laughing at it now!”
My hero.
So in a bulging, mutant nutshell, that’s where my head is at when I see a reunited Faith No More headlining the Download Festival with Korn, Limp Bizkit, Slipknot, Staind, and Papa Roach.
But that doesn’t mean I didn’t watch the live webcast. It’s the Album Of The Year lineup (Jon Hudson being the only suitable, proven replacement for Jim Martin), and despite all of my mixed feelings, Faith No More was one of the best bands to come along in my lifetime. Even the “professionally” shot videos I saw of them playing live growing up were produced with 1990s technology, and delivered to me through a long, strenuous chain of VHS duplications. The webcast was even more up-close and personal than I would have been if I was actually at the clusterfuck of a festival in person yesterday, let alone compared to anything I had experienced as a little teenage shit sneaking into arenas.
The performance was amazing. It spanned the band’s entire catalog, including the albums the band recorded with vocalist Chuck Mosley, before Patton joined in ‘88. They opened with Reunited (the Peaches & Herb song), before blasting through The Real Thing, From Out Of Nowhere, Land Of Sunshine, and Caffeine. I was blown away. Here’s one of the best clips to make its way online so far, Ashes To Ashes, from 1997’s Album Of The Year:
They did the Commodores track Easy, which has been well-documented as one of the best cover songs of all time here. They closed their first set with Mark Bowen, a cut only the most hardcore of fans have heard. For an encore, they did Stripsearch before closing with We Care A Lot, title track from their 1985 Patton-less album.
Not that I expected anything less, but they played the set entirely on their own terms. If the worst case scenario was reality, and the reunion was little more than a cash-grab, it would have been obvious to me and anyone else watching that grew up with the band. But judging by their performance at Download, Faith No More is back not because they ran out of money, or because the Peeping Tom album didn’t sell as many copies as Angel Dust. They’re back because they’re ready, and apparently still very fucking able.
Faith No More is pushing their luck. If they tour the states with fucking Brokencyde or some lame shit, or if they record a new album and it isn’t amazing, I’ll be seriously let down. And now Refused is my only perfect example of a band that quit while they were ahead and never looked back.
But… And I’ve been reluctant to say this since the initial announcement in February… Faith No More is back, and this is a good thing.
Faith No More
June 12, 2009
Donington Park, UK
Setlist:
01. Reunited (Peaches & Herb)
02. The Real Thing
03. From Out Of Nowhere
04. Land Of Sunshine
05. Caffeine
06. Evidence
07. Poker Face (Lady Gaga) / Chinese Arithmetic
08. Surprise! You’re Dead!
09. Easy
10. Last Cup Of Sorrow
11. Midlife Crisis
12. Introduce Yourself
13. The Gentle Art Of Making Enemies
14. Take This Bottle
15. Ashes To Ashes
16. Malpractice
17. Cuckoo For Caca
18. Be Aggressive
19. Epic
20. Mark Bowen
Encore:
21. Chariots Of Fire / Stripsearch
22. We Care A Lot
Thanks to Gareth for the setlist & live Twitter support.
Clips from the webcast are being collected over at Blabbermouth.
About Skwerl
Kevin "Skwerl" Cogill was taught his first computer programming language by his Mother's marijuana dealer at age ten. His first job involved hustling TicketMaster lines on behalf of a New Jersey concert ticket broker at age fourteen, followed by a job in graphic design shortly after graduating high school and trade school simultaneously in 1998. He built his first website in 1996 or so, and continues to do things the way they should be done, rather than the way everyone else does. He's a bit of an asshole, but he's fiercely loyal to fellow fans of good music.
Born and raised in Philadelphia, Skwerl now resides in Los Angeles.
June 13th, 2009 at 2:56 PM
I loved the whole webcast.
June 13th, 2009 at 2:57 PM
I think this is an incredibly well written stream of thoughts, I relate to so much of what you’re saying. Things that have been on my mind that I haven’t been able to articulate really.
I was at the Tomahawk, Astoria gig when Patton ‘pissed’ on the crowd. It was the only time I’ve ever been at the front of a gig and felt the audience actually pulling away in horror. Usually everyone’s squashing each other to get closer to their idols.
It was fucking hilarious really.
I am very curious about this legendary meeting in 2002. Are there any online sources about that? I remember Patton being interviewed around that time and making a comment about Chino being a drunken idiot, but I had no idea the context of them meeting.
I also totally agree about that webcast, it was so exciting to be so up close and see how the band communicate with each other onstage.
I have also been in two minds about the reunion, just from the point of view, that when I see other bands doing it, I am incredibly cynical. In the end though, I am happy enough if non-Faith No More fans call me a sheep and say I’m foolish for supporting them now, because I love them and I’m just so happy to see that they still care enough about this music to play it once again.
June 13th, 2009 at 3:09 PM
thanks man. i envy your experience! that story was originally told to me in a record shop somewhere around the time that it happened, before the internet was as useful as it is today. the original version i got didn’t separate the metal hammer interview from the astoria meeting- the way i heard it, patton dissed the nü-metal elite right to their faces before storming out. but here are what seems to be more accurate sources:
http://www.knac.com/article.asp?ArticleID=557
http://www.knac.com/article.asp?ArticleID=473
June 13th, 2009 at 4:42 PM
Soundgarden. But of course, now that Cornell’s fallen on his ass like Corgan, Rossdale, et al did with their respective solo debuts, expect news of their reunion within the next year or so.
These reunions would excite me much more if they’d happened five years ago. As it is, the world has moved on and I suddenly feel like my dad, who’s still celebrating The Eagles’ comeback from last year. I just can’t let anyone know I’m excited about an FNM reunion (even though they kicked ass last night) without losing face. I’d rather be looking forward to a new Mr Bungle record.
June 13th, 2009 at 4:45 PM
Soundgarden is a better example than Refused, because Refused never really had commercial success on a level that would be a huge temptation to go back to. It’s easy for someone to walk away from a band that no one has ever heard of, yknow?
Having said that, I also know what it’s like to have time go by and then naturally feel ok about being back in certain situation. Hell, I currently play in a band with Joe Light, John Bozzuto and Tom Roller. Between the 4 of us, we’ve all been fired or quit bands with one another at some point in the past. It happens.
June 13th, 2009 at 6:25 PM
ha. i understand your comment even if noone else does. as for refused, i would just make the point that refused existed in their own little ‘punkrock’ world, in which they were indeed huge. i suppose you’re right in the sense that they didn’t walk away from any piles of money, but i wouldn’t be surprised if they’ve been offered big checks since, given that they influenced and are worshipped by so many bands that did break into big mainstream success.
i left soundgarden out, because i never considered a soundgarden reunion out of the question. i figure that’s bound to happen sooner or later.
June 13th, 2009 at 6:57 PM
“And now Refused is my only perfect example of a band that quit while they were ahead and never looked back.”
Well yeah but… Kyuss. Sorry, had to say it.
June 13th, 2009 at 7:18 PM
hahah, come the fuck on skwerl, that nu-metal intervention was so obviously a joke
June 13th, 2009 at 8:35 PM
haha… sup dude. nah, i don’t think it was. i heard a lot of people were behind the plan, convinced they could get patton to go for it. i’ll have to find out for sure now though, gotta try and get an interview with someone that was supposedly there.
June 13th, 2009 at 8:48 PM
@passenger: huge fan of kyuss & garcia, but i don’t know enough about the story, don’t really know where they left things off or where they stand. homme obviously moved on to bigger things, but what’s garcia said? has there been pressure to reunite?i guess what makes an example perfect in my mind is the conviction to leave the money on the table and keep moving forward, when there’s pressure to dig up the dead.
June 15th, 2009 at 9:42 AM
Let’s also leave open the possibility that a band that has money on the table could also just want to reunite. I don’t know that there’s money on the table for Soundgarden to reunite, but none of those guys have ever really talked shit or ruled out a reunion. I’d love to have more great Soundgarden albums, but not if it meant Matt Cameron would leave Pearl Jam.
June 15th, 2009 at 10:31 AM
I respect Mike Patton’s integrity. I don’t think he would have done it if it was half assed. Where is Jim Martin??????? He was the shit. Best Patton project was Fantomas. Fucking intense.
June 15th, 2009 at 11:23 AM
pretty sure homme has stated that he’s been offered piles of money to get kyuss back together, but he’s not interested
June 15th, 2009 at 3:10 PM
Fuck Jim Martin..he was causing friction in the band and should just stick to growing pumpkins. I’m sick of hearing “where is Jim Martin?” What’s the appeal though? Yes he’s written most of the guitar tracks for ‘The Real Thing’ but in ‘Angel Dust’ he didn’t have the input people make out to be. Jon Hudson is a great guitarist and he wrote some of their best songs..’Ashes to Ashes’ and ‘Last Cup of Sorrow’…their current line-up is the best they had in their history.
June 15th, 2009 at 6:08 PM
more dick jokes
June 15th, 2009 at 8:40 PM
yeah i mean jim martin looks cool as shit and everything, and he’s a great guitarist. but to be real, from what i understand he didn’t contribute much to angel dust, besides jizzlobber. real thing is a classic album, and angel dust is probably my “favorite,” but there’s definitely a case for album of the year being their best.
i think anyone complaining that it isn’t the “original” lineup are pretty much jerkoffs.
June 15th, 2009 at 11:08 PM
Agreed skwerl.
June 16th, 2009 at 9:36 AM
Album of the year does kick ass. I just dig Martin’s guitar tone on The Real Thing. I had no idea he wasnt that involved with Angel Dust. That’s one of my faves. I would definitely like to see the new lineup, though.
June 19th, 2009 at 5:53 PM
DID YOU TELL THEM ABOUT YOUR NU METAL BAND ? :)
June 19th, 2009 at 7:00 PM
[...] been some talk around here about reunion phenomena. There’s certainly a lot to discuss- Who do we wish [...]
July 3rd, 2009 at 12:33 AM
passenger, i’m with you on the homme / kyuss thing. read up a bit. there are some choice quotes. he’s the man.
August 13th, 2009 at 3:27 AM
Interviewed anyone from the Nu Metal posse yet?
September 14th, 2009 at 11:52 PM
Well put Skwerl.
The dowload performance of Mark Bowen was JAW-DROPPING! Mike is still the top dog- by a longshot.
November 10th, 2009 at 12:03 PM
[...] where all the nü-metal guys tried to get Faith No More to reunite. It didn’t go so well. We wrote all about it back in [...]