Unsung Podcast

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Episode 107 - A Senile Animal by The Melvins

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The Melvins have a ton of back catagloue, and in our effort to reduce episode run times this year, we’ve tackled it with an unusual amount of brevity. In places. Not every place. But some places.

But that’s easy because some people, including our resident fan of the band Chris, think that they’re a band that has struggled to stay consistent for entire albums. Which, when you realise they’ve released 23 albums (and a bunch of other collaborative stuff) is somewhat understandable.

Yet there are occasions when they’ve managed to get their shit together for long enough to focus on an entire album. This is one of those albums.

Widely seen as the forefathers of both grunge and sludge (but don’t say the latter to their face), there’s an embarrassment of riches to be found throughout their entire oeuvre. The special moments occasionally last entire albums though, and this one is a prime example. It comes fairly late on in their career - it was released in 2006 - and is their 15th goddamn record.

After the departure of bassist Kevin Rutmanis, Buzz and Dale decided that, instead of just borrowing the bassist from Big Business for a bit, that they would just incorporate the entire band into their own. What follows is a quadruple vocal, double drummer affair with a bass tone that matches Buzz’s ferocious guitar tone lick for lick.

So this late career hurrah is, we feel, a little overlooked compared to some of their other records. But is it their unsung classic? You know what to do.