Review Summary: Queens Of The Stone age have brought sexy back.
Lullabies to Paralyze, the 2005 release from Queens of the Stone Age, was a stubborn bastard. It was sprawling. It was catchy and radio friendly, yet expansive and experimental. It was good, really good, yet could have been better. I never really did decide how much I liked it, or indeed, didnt. However, listening to Era Vulgaris I find I can finally see Lullabies in the correct focus. As you will have heard many other people say, using far more fluent and intellectual language than I - Lullabies was a 'transitional' album. This is normally branded on albums that arent that good, but show the band going to another place musically. Josh Homme, however, was faced with a transition in the truest sense of the word. Bassist Nick Oliveri had been sacked - a tough decision im sure, but one that was obviously needed to be made, for reasons we will never fully understand, and don't really need to know. Josh Homme was now a one man creative force with his band of hired mistrels by his side. This impacted the music on Lullabies quite heavily, the first album with solely Josh at the creative reigns. He had more freedom to do what he wished, and the album wasnt peppered with those lighthearted mock-metal diversions that gave past albums a certain charm. So where will this next album, Era Vulgaris, leave Queens of The Stone Age? Is the transition complete?
Well, all I know is that Era Vulgaris is one fantastic slab of dirty, sweaty, good ol' fashioned rock music. The first track, 'Turnin' On The Screw', resonates with a deep vocal melody before kicking into one of the catchiest drum beats I have ever heard. An absolute funk fest of jagged guitar punches and melodic vocal harmonies ensues, eventually giving way to a sliding guitar riff that has about as much melodic worth as a dodgy car engine. But my, it's beautiful. Not only is 'Turnin' On The Screw' a bold choice for an opening track, as it hardly bursts open the floodgates like previous openers have (bar Lullabies' acoustic ditty thing), but its also a swift reminder of the Queens of old. This is a happier Queens. One that has risen from the more murky flavours of Lullabies and has found its sexy/lazy desert rock footing once more. This is further reinforced by a second corker, 'Sick, Sick, Sick', a blistering garage rock orgie that is pure dirt in audio form. A top choice for a single, if ever there was one.
Track three, 'I'm Designer' plays with ideas of fame and being done over by 'the man' in order to be sold. This is enough bait for Homme to come up with some of his most witty and satirical lyrics to date, with such gems as - 'You've made me an offer that I can't refuse / cause either way I get screwed / counter proposal - I go home and jerk off'. This particular line even sporting a joyfull 'ugh' grunt at the end to accompany its colourful themes. 'Into The Hollow' is the kind of moody, haunting, yet beautiful melodious rocker that peppered Lullabies, but its arguably better than many previous attempts, with Josh doing a wonderful gritty rasp into a pitch perfect whale. He's been practicing, dont ya' know. 'Misfit Love' is a driving powerhouse of funky rock swagger that just keeps pummelling you until it releases into a wonderfully epic outro. It's at this point you realise they really have got hair back on their balls. This is the most confident the Queens have sounded for some time.
'Battery Acid' dabbles in epileptic punk outbursts to provide its kicks, with Josh adopting a particularly drunken whale to give it a little spice. As is the way, only a delightfully melodic chorus to counteract this sound would surfice, and here you get it, if only a glimpse before the song spasms once more. 'Make it Wit Chu' is a quite a mirror image to this, sporting a sound so lazy its actually quite unhealthy to listen to. If anyone was arguing that Josh had lost his 'cool' factor, this will make them think twice. His voice drips over the instrumentals, with some wonderful backing vocals and nice implementation of piano to give it that jazzy tinge. '3's & 7's' is strikingly catchy, and is sure fire single material. It's by numbers Queens of The Stone Age, but it has a bouncy, dare I say 'poppy' sound that is often resisted. It works though - alot - and the song is sent out on a brilliantly sinister outro, just to remind us that this is music with a pair.
The rest of the album generally takes a more relaxed approach, but this is where the problem with Era Vulgaris lies. It seems slightly top heavy. 'Suture Up Your Father' is a great track, moodily atmouspheric and soft for the most part, before breaking into a more layered guitar attack. The biggest problem with this track is that it just isnt long enough. What is there is great, but its cut off just as it starts to errupt - instead fading into some lonesome chord strumming. 'River In The Road', while again up to the teeth in atmousphere, seems unremarkable, and in comparison with anything from the first half, it seems to just trundle along until it runs out of steem. 'Run, Pig, Run' however, sees things veering back on track, with some haunting guitar squeals and powerhouse guitar punches. This track is also home to the best riff on the album - a kind of circus freak breakdown that sounds as if it was lifted from a nightmare and doused in hallucinogenics. A wonderful ending to the album. Unless, of course, you have the bonus tracks 'Running Joke' and 'Era Vulgaris', the first of which brings an even better ending to the cd, with, once again, some impressive vocals from Homme on this Lullabies-esque, well, lullaby. 'Era Vulgaris' is a good enough track, but doesnt stand up to much on the album and repeats the stop-start formula that they have used all too often on previous discs.
My gripes with this album are small, but they nonetheless exist. The second half seems to be a far more hard-to-swallow foray. I just believe if the tracks had been ordered more evenly it would have been one beast, instead of having two distinct parts. However, Era Vulgaris remains a superb album, and, some would argue, a return to form. If the 'form' was ever lost in the first place. As to whether the Queens' 'transition' is completed - what transition? This is the Queens we know and love, and they have created an album which bursts with diversity and creative swagger. It's flawed, but the fact remains they havent managed to create an album of this many colours so effectively since the days of Rated R. If this album says anything, its that Josh Homme still has more tricks up his sleeve than anyone could have imagined, and it will be exciting to see where Josh and his merry band of minstrels will end up next. Bring on album number six.
