### Melvins: The bulls & the bees

#### 05/04/12 || Habakuk

Having bought my first Melvins disc a few months ago, I have a feeling I’m a bit late to the Melvins camp, considering the band is older than myself and still cranking out (what appears to be) high-quality shit on an almost yearly basis – that is, if you only count full-lengths. The number of splits, EPs and whatever these guys appear on is nothing but staggering, and admittedly went completely under my radar for years on end. And this EP, the first genuine Melvins release in 2012 (an album’s already lined up) was fittingly brought to me in a fashion that deserves mention: Scion A/V.

What the hell is going on with these guys? Scion Audiovisual is the lifestyle division of Scion, which again is a division of Toyota. Sounds like a marketing stunt, and I treated it as such until they brought a first raised brow to my face by delivering the latest Immolation EP for free download. Apparently I downloaded that with my real email address, so now I receive their newsletter, which again turned me towards this here free EP. “What’s a Satanic death metal band to do with small cars?”, you might ask. More than you think, apparently. Maybe you haven’t seen the Municipal Waste car feature presentation either? Think of that what you may (I find it quite amusing), but reading through their site you can’t deny these folks are keeping their ear to the ground more than the “mainstream metal media”. That’s right, suck on that: Toyota.

Sadly enough, the Melvins seem to still need or at least profit greatly from this kind of support after 28 years. Who am I to complain though? I get this shit for free. And you get it for free as well, which you should consider, given the musical qualities at hand:

The 23 minutes of “The bulls & the bees” feature a great heavy yet laid-back blend of southern-tinged stoner. Basically, the band take you through all the facets of the genre, from a long strings-based song with clean chanting that culminates in reverb and white noise to straight-up riff-based CoC style heavy southern metal, a 7-minute sludge trip including echoing vocals, or an ambient-into-guitar lead driven instrumental. It’s hard to pinpoint these guys to a certain sound in a word or two, since they just wander off from the base described yet keep a good balance, with all elements compellingly put together. Often, stoner/“desert” rock bands including the Melvins feature self-indulgent guitar sound fests where they just let chords ring for a perceived minute before doing something worthwhile, but not here: Instead the EP contains rather concise arrangements, of course with a bit of breathing space and in a chilled-out style, but still keeping a noticeable direction.

The technicalities come in as a bonus to that: Buzz Osborne is a varied but always great-sounding vocalist, the production leaves nothing to desired with both guitars and the thick, rumbling bass shining in front of a massive drumming layer. The interplay of all instruments is great and you can definitely tell these guys enjoy this lineup, one which has lasted since 2006 already. I think we can take this as a good appetizer for the upcoming album “Freak Puke” – which actually features none of these songs here. With a massive output like theirs, if they only put half of their efforts into quality, there will be another release to look out for. From what “Bulls & bees” gives away they apparently do, or they simply shake arrangements from their sleeves. And yeah, again, it’s free. Your excuses – I see them coming – they are moot. Go.

- Information
- Released: 2012
- Label: Scion A/V
- Website: www.melvins.com
- Band
- Buzz Osborne: vocals, guitars
- Coady Willis: drums, backing vocals
- Jared Warren: bass, backing vocals
- Dale Crover: drums

- Tracklist
- 01. The war on wisdom
- 02. We are doomed
- 03. Friends before Larry
- 04. A really long wait
- 05. National hamster