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This band wrote The Real Thing? - 86%
Faith No More were certainly odd, at least in their later albums. Following Mike Patton’s phenomenal debut with the band, they ceased altogether to be a more or less genre-constricted group, with mixed results. Certain ventures (I’m looking at you, Angel Dust) did not work at all, being nothing more than a sonic headache, but when they did it right they were a band like no other. King for a Day is definitely one of those better moments.
These guys had to be on something when they wrote this stuff, especially Patton. Now, this isn’t the most abrasive or mind-bending thing he’s ever done, but for this musical area – I refuse to call it a genre, simply because there are too many at work – he’s still pretty insane. In the smooth jazz of “Evidence,” for example, he can be completely mellow and soulful, but in the very next song spew bile-drenched fits of hysteria. Combined with the instrumentalists’ knack for performing in many different styles, such as jazz, heavy metal, and even ska, while being equally messed up and unpredictable, this makes for rabidly spontaneous music. It rarely feels like variety for variety’s sake, as much of it turns out fluid and well done.
Raucous metal tends to dominate a lot of the songs, providing a bit of a base on which to classify the band’s music. The band displays a respectable knowledge of metal itself, despite being what some might call a “mainstream” band, not exactly fitting into the more extreme genres like Mike Patton’s other work. Thrash metal, for example, presents influence in the riffs of some of the harsher songs, and there is quite a bit of general heavy metal in the song structures and the compositional aspects as well as the overall sound.
Patton’s lyrics have also shifted from the funk-based tendencies of his first album with Faith No More where he obviously didn’t have much input, being recruited when the material was already written. In their place there are both strange, crazed pieces and more intelligently composed bits of innuendo and randomness. You won’t find Mr. Bungle’s manic sex cravings here. There’s the classic “it’s always funny ‘til someone gets hurt/And then it’s just hilarious” line, not to mention some weird-ass malevolence like in “The Gentle Art of Making Enemies.”
Most of the songs, while a lot of effort is spent in injecting them with a healthy dose of variety, also have much care taken to still work as enjoyable works of art. There’s no retarded piece of boredom á la “RV” where the band just didn’t care if it sounded good. In other words, the sprawling, chaotic annoyances of Angel Dust are no more.
King for a Day captures the essence of a band committed to creating powerful and imaginative music. I would say this is their most “metal” album, what with The Real Thing largely funk-based and Angel Dust infested with mallcore. Faith No More didn’t keep this up, only releasing one more album, but for now they were going strong.
