Dale Crover, The Fickle Finger of Fate, A Review (2017)

Dale Crover, The Fickle Finger of Fate, A Review (2017)

By: Ghost Writer

Rock N Roll Animal     

    

Considering the solo Lps a la Kiss each member of The Melvins issued a good number of years ago, this The Fickle Finger of Fate is not exactly a solo debut by drummer Dale Crover, Crover is an awesome drummer with lots of experience, a little bit overshadowed by the thick ooze of his band's music, playing painfully slow but taking full advantage of every space he can find between Buzz Osborne´s venomous guitars, the bass and the other drums the band have favored in their late recordings, he has even played in tandem with the great ex Slayer drummer Dave Lombardo in a joint adventure of Melvins and Fantomas, and considering that Lombardo is not shy about having a band of his own (Philm), Crover going as a solo artist (playing drums, bass and singing here) here is no big surprise, surprising might be the fact that this is a really good piece of music, combining avant garde drumming in the way of astonishing percussionists like Jon Mueller or Chris Corsano, with his band appeal for heaviness and sense of weirdness (and really strange humor a la Zappa), not even a bit bad for a guy who drums like is the end of the world.

Opener Chicken Ala King is an appropriate introduction to the brand of Crover's style of playing, quickly followed by the drums and bass heaviness of Bad Move that sounds like an ironic take on the loud-quiet dynamics of Nirvana, a band that owed a lot to The Melvins (and with whom Crover once drummed for in the great primitive Bleach), later allowing himself to those some experimental drums tracks, and then returning with the rocking Hillbilly Math, a wonderful piece of Southern sounding rock almost arriving at classic rock, but is Little Brother were Crover's unique sensitivity really blossoms and comes on its own, a perverse version of pop like Sonic Youth us we to play, but I guess is hard to escape from your roots and for Big Uns, gets back to Washington State brand of rock, at tomes recalling his influential band and others taking some borrowed influence from Seattle neighbors Mudhoney occasional toying with keyboards.

For the title track comes another surprise, a country tinged little ditty that might remind you of Beck's folksy wanderings, a great almost psychedelic tune with awesome guitars, again displaying in front of us one of the many surprising faces of Crover, a man capable of unveiling some of his deepest artistic expressions without fear in a beautifully conceived almost ethereal piece with some courageous guitar arrangements, returning almost immediately with a guitar and synth intense and malevolent creation named Thunder Pinky that wouldn’t sound so out of place on a Melvins album, is the sort of stuff perfectly suited for Crover´s style of drumming, heavy, laid back and thunderously loud, guitars perfectly  interlocking with Crover´s drums, but leaving us totally unprepared for a track like I Found the Way Out, a totally screwball that will left the hardcore Crover fan totally blown away, displaying an enormous similitude with the work of Pink Floyd, sounding even more Pink Floydesque than Roger Waters latest album, an amazing work destined to cement Crover´s reputation as a rock n roll artists with a truly particular vision and the capacity to create impressive and totally enjoyable music far from his comfort zone as a drummer with Osborne, The Fickle Finger of Fate is a totally worthy record, one that would immediately appeal to fans of the Melvins, the Butthole Surfers or the Flaming Lips, is one of those recordings that fall into the category of “finally  the punk rockers are taking acid”, a record titled coined by the Flaming Lips that perfectly describes that period of music when original 80s north American hardcore punk acts started getting really artistic and creative, and that’s exactly what Crover does here, the old punk and grunge drummer open his minds and opens his heart, and reveals a totally uncompromising approach, mind expanding mouth opening group of songs, with people like Osborne and Cover is no surprise the Melvins are still going strong after all these years.