The Mars Volta (1 Viewer)

[Tony-B]

I tried to see if a thread like this existed, but I am shocked to find nothing.

Anyways, I highly recommend that everyone here checks out The Mars Volta's latest album, Frances The Mute. The best way I could describe this album is that it's almost like Led Zepplin, Pink Floyd, Tool, and some Latin Music and Punk Rock all thrown into a blender. The result is one of the best and most original albums of the decade so far. Call me crazy, but I think that in the future this album will be put on the same level as Dark Side Of The Moon and other great albums.

The only problem that I have with this album is that the band likes to drift off into extended passages of just sound effects. It really isn't that big of a problem, but it just affects the album's ability to hold your attention.

One more thing I just found out that makes the connection between TMV and Pink Floyd even stronger is that cover artwork was done by none other than Storm Thorgerson, the man who created many of the Pink Floyd album covers, including DSOTM.



So, I highly recommend buying a copy of Frances The Mute. It's only like $10 at most stores, and trust me, it's totally worth the price.

 

[TheLongshot]

Tony, do you have their first album?

I thought the first album was pretty good. Pretty complex stuff with a sort of Santana-ish vibe. Can't say I care for the lead singer, but it is some nice stuff to listen to.

Jason

 

[Tony-B]

Jason, I don't have the first album, but based on the strength of Frances The Mute, I will get it sometime in the near future.

 

[Kevin C Brown]

I tried this one and De-Loused in the Comatorium, both on the recommendation that there was Zeppelin-esqe stuff in there.

There is, but ... I don't know. I just couldn't get into it. There were definitely passages/sections on both CDs that I liked. But overall? I just felt like they are all over the map and couldn't find a direction to go in. ymmv.

 

[nickGreenwood]

It's some very weird stuff going on in there, I would go as far as to say that Pink Floyd had nothing on these guys when it comes to weird. But it is a good album. The lead singer reminds me of a mix of Robert Plant and the lead singer for Coheed and Cambria.
I would recommend it as well though.

 

[Tony-B]

That's what I thought when I first heard Frances The Mute, but as time went on and I payed closer attention, it got better and better to listen to.

I bet that your problem comes from those long passages where they just use sound effects, keyboards, and synthsizers. As I said in the first post, that is the major problem that I have with the album too.

Nick, I'll definitely agree with your statement that TMV is weirder than Pink Floyd.

 

[John Garcia]

The lead singer immediately reminded me of early Chris Cornell. I saw these guys last summer when they opened for A Perfect Circle. They are quite interesting live - the lead singer is fairly tall and lanky, with a big afro and bell-bottoms looking very 60s, and he danced like James Brown the whole time. It was like Jimmy Hendrix meets Santana, with a little Floyd to me. I couldn't tell when one song ended and the next one started sometimes; it was almost like they only played 5 songs that all lasted 20 minutes each (which got kind of boring at times). I enjoyed it, but they are quite unusual, and I'm not sure I would recommend the album to everyone. They might be fun to see live at least once though

 

[ChrisDixon]

I thought De-Loused was a very promising debut. Very intense, and dare I say, breaking some new ground? My only complaints were:

1. Midrange was too high in the mix. The vocals become very fatiguing at about the half way point.

2. Not quite enough diversity for my tastes. It gets kind of redundant by the end.

I had pretty high hopes for Frances. It seemed like they were on the verge of something really special. Unfortunately, I think it is a step backwards. There are some good parts, but they are too burried amidst self-indulgent meandering and sonic noodling. It also doesn't shake the "sameness" of the arrangements. The Cuban jazz tune is the high point, but it most leaves me flat. That said, it's good to see adventurous music achieve a degree of commercial success. I'm hoping that the same holds true for the new Porcupine Tree release.

Chris

 

[MikeFR]

De-Loused was good but Frances the Mute is a step back IMO. The 'good parts' are stuffed between long stretches of 'annoying parts'. The album is difficult to listen to, it takes far too much effort and in the end the effort is not worth it.
These points apply to Frances as well. For some reason the album sounds extremely 'loud' and the music just isn't dynamic enough. Too much 'loud-loud-loud' without any dynamic parts to balance things out. The sound simply gets really monotonous. There is some really good stuff on Frances the Mute, but in the end it takes to much effort to find it.

For reference Tool is my second favorite band so I have no problem with weird, heavy, prog type stuff.

 

[Chris Tedesco]

Dig um.

 

[Kevin N]

I like The Widow and especially L'Via L'Viaquez, but whoever thought it'd be a good idea to just degenerate into random noise is crazy. I mean, they're such good songs, but ruined by that simple fact.

I have no problem with sound effects and long meandering tunes, I mean Mogwai is one of my favorite bands, but it at least has to have a melody to it. Otherwise it's just noise.