Jupter; Song 8: Torture Me

…And back to our (semi)-regular programming. Initially not one of the songs that I immediately liked, it only made more sense to me after Binh, my pharmacist friend who car-pools with me and would have heard the album in its entirety at least 25 times as it’s the only thing I play in my car, picked it as one of his favourite tracks. It’s a song that has a terrific energy about it, courtesy of Chad’s snazzy drum work, and will no doubt wonders live. Once again Flea’s trumpets add a lot of “zest” (as Binh said) to the proceedings, adding a South American flavour to the piece, and hence incorporating another part of Californian culture into Red Hot Chili Peppers’ body of work. John’s back-up vocals are prevalent once more, and used better than they normally are.

The song has an interesting song structure for a party song, as “Torture Me” slows down about halfway through. This section sounds good individually, and it would have made for a good mellow jam elsewhere on Stadium Arcadium. Arguably it serves greater purpose as a launch pad to John’s solo, essentially reinforcing the chaotic nature of the rest of the song.

Having read Anthony Kiedis’ autobiography “Scar Tissue”, I’ve come to understand his life view; that it makes sense to appreciate the downs as well as the ups, as this provides life experience leading to personal development. This theme for the song makes “Torture Me” more than a trivial rockin’ song, and hence a solid addition to Stadium Arcadium.

Hmmm, a bit shorter than the usual ones. I’ll make up for it soon, as some of my favourite tracks are coming sooner rather than later. Anyway, Stadium Arcadium has been out for a few months now; what songs are you keen on entering the public consciousness as singles?

In the spirit of something I can’t talk about because it’s a secret, here are

My ten favourite bands!

Well some of them anyway.

10) Audioslave
I’m can’t remember what exactly inspired me to purchase Audioslave’s first album (Self-titled) in 2002, especially since I never heard the entirety of one whole Rage Against The Machine album at the time, and I certainly wasn’t a die-hard Soundgarden fan. All I remember is listening to Tom Morello kicking off the record with the helicopter sounds of “Cochise” (all sounds still created with guitar, bass, drums and vocals thank you very much), and that did it for me. This was to be the first heavy rock album that I was to hear from start to finish, and indeed it served as a mind-blowing introduction to the possibilities within rock music, with its start-stop dynamic changes and song structures that support the strength of the great riffs. Even though I feel the sophomore effort (Out of Exile) wasn’t as strong as the debut, I still remain a fan of the band’s musicianship (both individually and as a whole) and the psychedelic tones that Chris Cornell brings. Try listening to the first single off the new album Revelations called “Original Fire” (streaming from http://audioslave.com/), I swear it sounds like Ray Charles singing on an AC/DC song.

9) Rage Against The Machine
When people think of Rage Against The Machine, I think they look most favourably upon Zack de la Rocha’s political and wonderfully rhythmic and furious raps, as well as Tom Morello’s innovative guitar work. However, what speaks to me most about Rage’s music is the rhythm section that holds it all together. Some people often lament that if the band stayed together for longer, they would have been able to push the limits of their style and broaden their sound a bit. I prefer to look back fondly at a band that you could always rely on to make a groove as thick and as funky as possible, that should have been praised for having a political conscience before it was acceptable to do so (thanks for ruining it Dixie Chicks). In a better world, Rage Against the Machine would be considered dance music, although in a perfect world, they would never have had to exist at all.


8) Led Zeppelin
They could do and did it all, blues, funk, middle Eastern, reggae, folk, and (without wanting to sound like Marcia Hines) truly made it their own. Losing John Bonham was a tragedy, but to me Led Zeppelin were the spirit of the 1970s, much as the Beatles were to the 1960s, and thus fulfilled their contribution to the human condition. So good that even a cover band of these guys rate as one of my favourite shows.

7) Ben Folds Five
Yes, said frontman would go on to crafting wonderful AM style pop songs such as “The Luckiest” and “Not The Same”, as well as having the enviable task of producing and co-writing William Shatner’s 2004 album “Has Been” (which I am quite keen on hunting down one of these days). But Ben Folds Five (1994-2000) was something special. I dislike fancy pants jazz but I love the improvisation-lite tone of some of the songs. The songs still have Folds’ lyrical style, which usually incorporates concise story-telling, but Robert Sledge and Darren Jessee’s harmonies always come in at the right time to make a great song like “Kate” into a true pop masterwork. A band that could sound as small or as large as they wanted to, and in some of their best songs switched between both extremes (“Missing The War”, “Narcolepsy”). Their last album The Unauthorized Biography of Reinhold Messner wins the award for the slowest grower of any album, as it took me five years to fully appreciate, and now songs off that record like “Don’t Change Your Plans” and “Regrets” are amongst my favourite. Also “Underground” will forever have a special place in my heart, as my unofficial theme song of the muso community in St Iggies.

6) AC/DC
The Alpha and Omega. By listening to AC/DC and playing along to Highway to Hell and Back in Black, two of the most perfect collections of music ever, AC/DC has influenced my whole guitar style more than any other artist. For better or worse, no matter what type of music I’m listening to, I always revert to the same bluesy licks that have been ingrained in my head for years. And that’s because I’ve ripped off (proudly) from Angus Young, well as much as someone of my low, low standards can. The Back in Black record also represents the other reason that I rate AC/DC so highly: the ability for the boys to carry on so quickly after Bon Scott’s unfortunate “death by misadventure”. In today’s music landscape this would be the equivalent of the lead singer of the Pussycat Dolls dying, getting a new lead singer 2 days later, and then proceeding to sell 15 million copies of their next album six months later. That, my friends, is rock and roll. Whenever I feel like I’m stuffing around instead of working, I ask myself, would the Young brothers fuck around when they were in the Bahamas recording Back in Black? And then I remember that they’ve been promising a new album every year for the last four years and I don’t feel so bad.

Hmm, what an uninspiring way to end my piece. Howabout if I throw in a

TO BE CONTINUED!!!

Yeah that’ll do it.