The Melvins
When the self proclaimed ‘best band in the history of music’ - (The) Melvins - got together in 1984, they numbered Buzz Osborne on guitar and vocals, Matt Lukin on bass (beware – he’s the first of many) and Mike Dillard on drums, three lads who all went to school together in Montesano in Washington. They were named after a colleague of Osborne’s, the most hated fellow at the Thriftway Grocers in Montesano, and a man whose name seemed appropriately ridiculous. During Dillard’s time behind the drums the band stuck to Hendrix and Who covers before moving on to hardcore punk (the like of which can be heard on their recent ‘Mangled Demos’ compilation). Said drummer soon departed (amidst rumours that the songs were becoming too mathematically complex) to be replaced with Dale Crover, at the time a fifteen year old playing in an Iron Maiden covers band, who remains the drummer ‘til this day. Switching their practice space to Crover’s folks’ house in Aberdeen, Washington, their music took a turn for the slower, and much, much heavier.
The most famous resident of Aberdeen? Undoubtedly Kurt Cobain, who grew up as a huge Melvins fan, helping them to transport equipment around shows and eventually producing some of the band’s records, most notably their major label debut ‘Houdini’. He’d also auditioned to join the band on guitar, but was so nervous that he forgot all the songs.
The first Melvins compositions to find their way in to the public consciousness, albeit on a small scale were four tunes featured on ‘Deep Six’, a compilation issued by C/Z Records (a label set up to document the Washington Music scene) in 1985. A year later on the same label came the first stand alone Melvins release titled ‘Six Songs’, which has since been re-released in beefed up versions as ‘Eight Songs’, ‘Ten Songs’ and most recently ‘Twenty Six Songs’ respectively. Their first full length was released in 1987, though recorded in the December of the previous year, was titled ‘Gluey Porch Treatments’ and came out on Alchemy Records.
Aside from the Melvins, drummer Dale Crover would help out with Nirvana when they recorded an early ten song demo in 1988 (having been a founding member of Cobain’s first band Fecal Matter), but the association became intermittent when he and Buzz Osborne moved relocated to California. Matt Lukin, at the time the Melvins’ bassist, stayed in Washington and formed Mudhoney. He was replaced by Lori Black, aka Lorax (bizarrely, Shirley Temple’s Daughter), whose first recorded appearance with the Melvins would be for 1989’s ‘Ozma’, a record produced by Mark Deutrom who himself would later become one of the Melvins’ many, many bass players.
Crover didn’t annexe himself totally from Nirvana, rejoining briefly in 1990 to play a West Coast tour with Sonic Youth. Presumably pissed off at former uber-fan Cobain nicking his drummer whenever he felt like it, Buzz gave Nirvana bassist Krist Novoselic Dave Grohl’s number – and we all know how that ended. Some of Dale Crover’s input for Nirvana can be heard on their excellent ‘Incesticide’ compilation, if you’re so inclined.
The Mevlins’ next album was the still very highly regarded ‘Bullhead’ in 1991 (often cited as one of the heaviest albums of all time, the first track on which would provide the band Boris with their name), which, after a tour of Germany (a show from which would go on to constitute the ‘Your Choice Live Series Vol.12’ live LP), was followed closely by the ‘Eggnog’ EP, released in the same year on the marvellously rude Boner Records.
Upon Lori Black’s departure from the Melvins (her current whereabouts, even her status as alive or dead, are murky) she found herself replaced by Joe Preston, currently of High on Fire. However, Preston’s time in the band was brief, contributing only to the 1992 ‘Salad of a Thousand Delights’ video (now available on DVD), the ‘Lysol’ album of the same year (though it’s now often simply titled ‘Melvins’, as Boner didn’t know ‘Lysol’ was actually a registered trademark at the time) and his own Melvins ‘solo’ EP. During this period, inspired by the Kiss solo albums, even completely ripping off the artwork, the individual Melvins members released solo EPs titled ‘King Buzzo’, ‘Dale Crover’ and ‘Joe Preston’ respectively, though the remaining two members count Preston’s to be the worst of the three, as he reportedly by that point couldn’t really be bothered.
Subsequently, like so many who went before and others who would follow him, Joe Preston was sacked, and for the 1993 recording of the Kurt Cobain produced ‘Houdini’ Lorax would briefly regain her place on the bass guitar. By this point of course, Nirvana had exploded with ‘Nevermind’, and Cobain’s influence in the music industry was now extensive enough for the Melvins to land a deal with the major label Atlantic, for whom they would release three totally superb albums, ‘Houdini’ being the first. Mark Deutrom, previously the band’s producer, would replace Lorax after the ‘Houdini’ sessions, adding his bass playing skill to ‘Stoner Witch’ and the mind blowing ‘Stag’. After these three albums, for some baffling reason, the band were dropped by Atlantic, probably because they hadn’t written their ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’. They would however release ‘Melvinmania: The Best of the Atlantic Years’ in 2003, much to the band’s annoyance as they had no input in the project at all. Subsequently, a shoddy job with inaccurate liner notes became one of the biggest selling Melvins releases.
To make up the money to cover the ‘Stoner Witch’ sessions after the amount they’d spent on ‘Houdini’, the band recorded the ridiculously off the cuff ‘Prick’ for Amphetamine Reptile records, under the name ‘SNIVLEM’ (get it?) in early 1994. The name change was due to Altantic not letting them release any records under the name The Melvins on another label. Listen to it. It’s a mess. After being dumped by the majors, they’d return to this littler imprint for the ‘Honky’ LP, and would also release their pleasantly titled second live record ‘Alive at the F**kerclub’ in 1998.
Ok, so that’s already nine studio albums, not counting solo EPs, side projects, endless seven inches or live records, but things were still about to go up another gear. In 1999 the Melvins truly found a place to call home when an association with Mike Patton’s Ipecac label began. Mike began remastering and reissuing old Melvins records which had become increasingly difficult to get hold of, and also commissioned the recording of the most ambitious Melvins project to date – ‘The Trilogy’. This was a three part set of albums called ‘The Maggot’, ‘The Bootlicker’ and ‘The Crybaby’, the latter a collaboration with many artists including The Jesus Lizard’s David Yow, Patton himself and Godzick Pink which featured a bizarrely tender version of Nirvana’s ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’ as a duet with Leif Garret. Listen to it – it ends with the word ‘AGAIN!’ shouted very, very loudly. Former Cows bassist Kevin Rutmanis had four-string duties at this point, and would keep them for longer than any other Melvins bass player, perhaps most notably on the brilliant ‘Hostile Ambient Takeover’. The relationship with Patton had developed from when Osborne joined his experi-METAL outfit Fantomas for their self titled debut album, that being the first release on Ipecac and ‘The Maggot’ being the second. It’s widely held that without the Melvins, there would be no Ipecac.
Ipecac allowed the Melvins a place to really indulge in some of their less commercial tendencies, for example issuing the hour long one track noise opus ‘Colossus of Destiny’, recorded entirely live, and their two decade career retrospective book ‘Neither Here Nor There’, a collection of art and prose coupled with a CD of tracks hand picked by the band from each of their albums.
2004 saw the Melvins collaborate with one time Throbbing Gristle associate Lustmord for ‘Pigs of the Roman Empire’ and then with Dead Kennedy’s vocalist Jello Biafra for ‘Never Breathe What You Can’t See’ (a remix album of which, ‘Sieg Howdy!’, would follow the year later). Of these collaborations, ‘Pigs…’ received by far the warmest reaction and is regarded as a proper Melvins record as opposed to the comparatively flimsy Jello Biafra releases. The Melvins would also in this period act as the live soundtrack for the films of Cameron Jamie around Europe and the USA.
Amid rumours of drug abuse, Kevin Rutmanis would leave the band in June 2005, the likes of David Scott Stone and Trevor Dunn filling in his shoes for live duties at the time, including the band playing their classic ‘Houdini’ live from beginning to end (though they messed around with the running order) at the request of All Tomorrow’s Parties and their Don’t Look Back season. Scott Stone had been a long term associate of the band and is often regarded as an unofficial member of the Melvins, playing on ‘Honky’, ‘Colossus of Destiny’, ‘Hostile Ambient Takeover’, ‘Pigs of the Roman Empire’ and the live album recorded on new year’s eve 1999 with Fantomas, ‘Millennium Monsterwork’.
This year, things changed again – the Melvins recruited both members of Big Business, Coady Willis and Jarred Warren, on bass and drums (meaning they now have two drummers) to write, play and record with them. The resulting record is ‘(A) Senile Animal’. Their 17th stand alone album as The Melvins, it’s out on October 9th.
THE MELVINS DOT NET: Affectionately referred to as simply ‘dot net’ by Melvins fans on the web, this is about the most comprehensive, up to date collection of Melvins information and trivia you’ll find in cyberspace. If it happened, and it wasn’t reported here, then it pretty much didn’t happen.
MELVINS OFFICIAL: A few rare live mp3s and covers to download, and some intermittently updated news for you. Not the most comprehensive of pages, but worth a look – we assume the band can’t be bothered and are just making a noise somewhere instead.
MELVINS SPACE: OK, now even The Melvins have a MySpace. This has gone too far. How can I balance the evil Murdoch-ness of everything with the holiness of free music?! Help (and go listen to ‘Hooch’)!!!
THE MELVINS ON IPECAC: Buzz Osborne’s a funny guy, and his press release about ‘(A) Senile Animal’ is well worth reading. It’s also worth taking the time to investigate every single note of music ever made by anyone on Ipecac (and even the bits where they aren’t playing recognisable notes, too).
THE MELVINS ALBUMS RETROSPECTIVE: Resident Melvins obsessive Charles Potter initiates the uninitiated by giving a detailed run through every single Melvins EP and LP ever released. He is the knowledge.
THE MELVINS @ THE FORUM: The first time we caught the Melvins was amidst a veritable Ipecac showcase of majestic proportions – first, the dreamy drones of Guapo, then the disturbing cabaret of Kaada before the Melvins played a greatest hits set in support to label head honcho Mike Patton’s Tomahawk.
THE MELVINS PLAY ‘HOUDINI’ @ KOKO: It’s just a shame ATP’s ‘Don’t Look Back’ season only happens once a year. In ’05, we got to hear all of the Melvins’ classic ‘Houdini’ played live for us, although of course what with it being the Melvins, they messed around with it a little bit. Track twelve actually comes first, apparently.