Primus - Frizzle Fry

Music elitists are always fun to argue with, and one of my favorite points of discussion is Primus. Primus are a very divisive band. Either you think they are immortal, masters of their trade, or you think that it's the worst schlock ever put down on tape. They have a strange fan base, the skaters like them (which I have yet to understand), the potheads like them (which is completely obvious), and any musician with an appreciation for technical ability mixed with the absurd (or a Monty Python fan) will at least find them slightly interesting. However if you go to a guys house and look at his CD collection and you see Belle & Sebastian, Mogwai and the Fourtet remixes, the chances are Primus aren't next to them.

The music snobs love to put them down as being a cheesy band. I hear them lament about how they cannot stand to hear Les Claypool sing. His nasally drawl sends shivers up their spine.

Listen.

This is not a newsflash. I am pretty sure that Primus know they are cheesy. I think they are OK with it. They have an album cover of a boat SAILING A GIANT SEA OF CHEESE. You don't have to be a Rhodes Scholar to put that together. I don't mind people criticizing albums but what pisses me off is when people don't take intention into consideration. Talent does not give you an obligation to be serious with what you do. Primus were weird, kooky, silly guys, and they made weird, kooky, silly albums. Les' voice, well that had to come with the package. Someone had to sing.

You're just pissed off because they can play better than you (and everyone you know) and they use their collective genius to write songs like Professor Nutbutter's House Of Treats instead of composing film scores.

Just because it's silly, doesn't mean it can't be awesome. I have listened to Primus my entire life, and while some albums don't age as well as others, Frizzle Fry is as impressive now as it was then. I still have no idea who the hell taught Tim Alexander how to play the drums, but I think there was something wrong with them. Like, mentally.

Tim Alexander interprets music in a way that can't be understood by anyone other than Tim Alexander. When I listen to Primus I feel like the three weirdest guys from three different high schools somehow found each other and started a band.

Tim had to sift through the insanity of Claypool's basslines, ignore the guitar (which was pretty much always out of time, and usually made no sense), and come up with drum parts that would make a bunch of stoned teenagers want to jump around and lay on top of each others hands (as in crowd surfing, you perverts). I still can't believe some of the shit he pulls of on this record. He has a smooth, fast kick drum foot (Mr Knowitall, Pudding Time), he can throw drum rolls in anywhere (Spaghetti Western), and he can go from rock, to funk, to metal to anything else in one song (Harold of the Rocks).

Tim always seems to be fully, completely aware of what he is doing on the drums. Everything feels proper and thought out. His kick drum is always dead on with Claypool's bass. Maybe it is just the ultimate bass player/drummer relationship. Claypool and Alexander just had so much ability that they created this partnership and took it to much further places that it had ever been (or should have gone, some would say). Tim manages to tap into a part of his brain that most musicans don't have (or avoid), and it gives him a very unique touch on the drums.

I am just glad that Primus were around at the same time as Celine Dion so that they could distract teens from the real world for minute or two.