Review Round Up

[Pandemonium]

AV Club gave it an F. http://www.avclub.com/articles/janes-ad ... ist,63452/

WOOOOOOW...I don't ever remember seeing a band get eaten up and chewed out like that. Even when Pithfork gives an album a good tearing into, they will sometimes still give it anywhere from a 4/10 to 6/10.

Read the comments section under that review. People are HATIN' big time! Pretty embarrassing. :cona:

There seems to be a lot of "To Cool For Rawk" types posting their idiocy in the comments section of that article (which could have been written by Sonny).

[ESY]

Look, I am old enough to remmember when Big Black's song's about fucking came out and it was universally panned. It is a classic. Music reviews are bullshit. Why would anyone care about someone that makes a living from writing about music? Music reviews usually involve intellectual wankery and have little to do with passion and feel. I think that is why Radiohead is so beloved - they are perfect fodder for music reviewers!

[Kajicat]

Do you really care about that?

I like it and in the end that's all that matters for me.

I don't reeeeeally care...but I'll admit it is sad to see what people now think of this once legendary band. I agree though that in the end all that matters if if you like it or not, not what other people think. One Hot Minute is my favorite RHCP album and a lot of RHCP fans give me shit about it, and it got slammed by critics upon release, but that doesn't keep it from being arguably my favorite album of all time.

There seems to be a lot of "To Cool For Rawk" types posting their idiocy in the comments section of that article (which could have been written by Sonny).

Indeed. That's a pretty accurate description. Wouldn't be surprised if Sonny wrote one of those comments at all.

[creep]

i was listening to the jason ellis show on sirius and they do a segment where they review new music by listening to one song and they played irresistible force. i thought it was funny that his review was that the song was pretty good but "there is no way in hell that he is singing that chorus live. this is one song that they won't be doing." well i guess he forgot about backing tracks.

[trevor ayer]

one hot minute is a pretty great record .. but the reviewers got it right on escape artist .. broken people is forgiveable in many ways .. the rest is pure heresy

[Tyler Durden]

Do you really care about that?

I like it and in the end that's all that matters for me.

I don't reeeeeally care...but I'll admit it is sad to see what people now think of this once legendary band. I agree though that in the end all that matters if if you like it or not, not what other people think. One Hot Minute is my favorite RHCP album and a lot of RHCP fans give me shit about it, and it got slammed by critics upon release, but that doesn't keep it from being arguably my favorite album of all time.

That's because the average RHCP fan is a moron (who probably is a "casual music listener").

As for the critics, One Hot Minute was relatively well received; it got many good reviews.

[CaseyContrarian]

That's because the average RHCP fan is a moron (who probably is a "casual music listener").

[Kajicat]

Do you really care about that?

I like it and in the end that's all that matters for me.

I don't reeeeeally care...but I'll admit it is sad to see what people now think of this once legendary band. I agree though that in the end all that matters if if you like it or not, not what other people think. One Hot Minute is my favorite RHCP album and a lot of RHCP fans give me shit about it, and it got slammed by critics upon release, but that doesn't keep it from being arguably my favorite album of all time.

That's because the average RHCP fan is a moron (who probably is a "casual music listener").

As for the critics, One Hot Minute was relatively well received; it got many good reviews.

The average RHCP fan has been moronic since Californication came out, but from when the band started all the way through OHM I'd say they RHCP still had a really good amount of serious music listeners. Nowadays it's mostly pre-teen girls and people who think Frusciante is literally a God.

Critically and commercially, OHM was seen as a huge letdown as the followup to BSSM. It only went Gold a little while after release and everyone was all pissed that it didn't meet BSSM numbers Eventually it went platinum (possibly multiplatinum actually I think) but the initial reviews were all like "THEY R DARK N UPSET NO FUNK CHANGED 2 MUCH DEATH 2 NAVARRO" for the most part. Of course singles like Aeroplane and My Friends will live on through time, but my favorite...Warped...will not. :cona:

[Tyler Durden]

Critically and commercially, OHM was seen as a huge letdown as the followup to BSSM. It only went Gold a little while after release and everyone was all pissed that it didn't meet BSSM numbers Eventually it went platinum (possibly multiplatinum actually I think) but the initial reviews were all like "THEY R DARK N UPSET NO FUNK CHANGED 2 MUCH DEATH 2 NAVARRO" for the most part. Of course singles like Aeroplane and My Friends will live on through time, but my favorite...Warped...will not. :cona:

I was strictly referring to critics' reactions to the album, not sales. And as I previously stated, One Hot Minute got good reviews overall; it just didn't get "classic" reviews a la BSSM.

[sonny]

the metacritic score based on five reviews so fa is 49 which is not very good.

http://www.metacritic.com/music/the-great-escape-artist

from one of the reviews

Farrell comes across like a man in the midst of an identity crisis, flitting between juvenile boasts and wrong-headed takes on domestic bliss in the space of a song on the ponderous ‘Splash A Little Water On It’. It’s probably telling that the only time he really sounds at home is when he’s looking back on a time before fame (“I laid my bed out / On my back seat” on ‘Twisted Tales’). But that’s only half the problem. ‘The Great Escape Artist’ is one-paced, bloodless, and frequently blighted by Dave Navarro’s ersatz Edge-isms. It’s only on closing stomper ‘Words Right Out Of My Mouth’ that they finally cut loose, but it’s too little, too late.

i'm trying to tell folks.

radiohead's new one 80
wilco's new one 84

And both make me go sleepy time. Radiohead could fart a new album out and critics would rave about it because Radiohead is the defacto art band that must be praised.

not true. their remix of king of limbs has a score close to JA's new album.

yr misjudging this album because it's new. it sucks, i sorta feel bad saying that because people want this band to be relavant again.

[sonny]

Radiohead is boring as fuck.

Yep, hate all the hipsters my age who act like Thom Yorke is god.

could be they're all right.

[Kajicat]

Critically and commercially, OHM was seen as a huge letdown as the followup to BSSM. It only went Gold a little while after release and everyone was all pissed that it didn't meet BSSM numbers Eventually it went platinum (possibly multiplatinum actually I think) but the initial reviews were all like "THEY R DARK N UPSET NO FUNK CHANGED 2 MUCH DEATH 2 NAVARRO" for the most part. Of course singles like Aeroplane and My Friends will live on through time, but my favorite...Warped...will not. :cona:

I was strictly referring to critics' reactions to the album, not sales. And as I previously stated, One Hot Minute got good reviews overall; it just didn't get "classic" reviews a la BSSM.

Well Okay then. I always remember OHM reviews being scored quite a bit lower than albums like BSSM, Cali, BTW, and SA. But I'm With You received about the same type of reviews...so yeah I guess "good" is about right as far as professional reviewers were concerned. Still, some critics shit all over it.

[cursed male]

The Burg Review: Jane's Addiction - The Great Escape Artist
18 October 2011

Jane's Addiction find new artistic life on "The Great Escape Artist"

"I’m a hustler/I’ll never give up the underground," sings Perry Farrell in his patented snarling croon at the start of "Underground," the opening track of "The Great Escape Artist," only the fourth studio album his band Jane’s Addiction have released in 23 years, and their first since 2003’s subpar "Strays."

Even if he’s just role-playing, it’s still one of the more honest, revealing, and accurate lines he’s ever written.

Because, no matter what you think of Farrell, he’s always been as much a schemer as singer, going all the way back to the early days of Jane’s Addiction, when he and the band’s founding bassist Eric Avery conceived of an art-damaged answer to the spandexed metal that ruled Sunset Strip in the ’80s, recruited two hard-rock castaways (drummer Stephen Perkins and guitarist Dave Navarro), and hit a crucial nerve with the aptly titled 1988 modern classic "Nothing’s Shocking."

That album and 1990’s "Ritual de lo Habitual" were, at the very least, instrumental in laying the groundwork for the alternative explosion spearheaded by Nirvana in ’91. Jane’s didn’t stick around much longer to reap the considerable rewards of the mainstreaming of the underground.

By late ’91, with the departure of Avery and Navarro, they’d broken up.

But a good hustler is always working on his next big idea, and Farrell’s was a brilliant one: in the summer of ’91 he helped inaugurate the first Lollapalooza, a traveling festival of alternative artists that Jane’s Addiction headlined as a de-facto farewell tour. Not a bad way to go out, especially since it left Farrell at the creative/conceptual helm of an institution that came to define the alternative ’90s.

Not all of Farrell’s schemes have panned out quite so well.

When he tired of Lollapalooza, Farrell dreamed up something of a rock-meets-rave twist on the festival tour, christened it ENIT, and brought his new band, the Jane’s-lite Porno for Pyros, along for what turned out to be a bumpy, and ultimately short-lived run in ’95/’96. (Of course, by the following year, in the absence of Farrell’s curatorial prowess, Lollapalooza had more or less run its course.)

And his 2005-2007 experiment with Satellite Party, a new-agey collective that included wife Etty Lau Farrell, ex-Extreme guitarist Nuno Bettencourt, and, at various times, Fergie of Black Eye Peas, New Order bassist Peter Hook, and members of the Red Hot Chili Peppers, was perhaps a tad too ambitious to properly get off the ground.

Through it all, Jane’s have loomed in the backdrop, reuniting from time to time with various bassists — Flea in ’97, Porno for Pyros’ Martyn LeNoble (2001-2004), and, most recently, Avery (2008-2010) — mostly as a festival-ready nostalgia act, performing fan faves from their early albums. The notion that they might ever match the raw power and artful majesty of "Nothing’s Shocking" in the studio seemed, at best, improbable.

But Farrell, the hustler, has once again pulled off a major artistic coup, largely by looking to the "underground" for a fresh muse.

When Avery once again jumped ship last year, he brought former Guns ’N Roses/Velvet Revolver bassist Duff McKagan on board to write songs for a new album. When that didn’t work out, he drafted an unlikely collaborator, multi-instrumentalist David Sitek of Brooklyn’s TV On the Radio.

Sitek proved to be more than just a fill-in bassist: he co-wrote seven of the disc’s 10 tracks, added guitar, keyboards, and programming to the sessions, and assisted in the production.

In fact, it wouldn’t be going too far to say that, with the exception of Farrell’s unmistakable vocals, Sitek’s aesthetic — a masterful marriage of digitalized electro-organic instrumentation, deep beats, and soaring melodies — is the dominant force on "The Great Escape Artist."

"End to the Lies," the first of two singles that have already been released, begins, in typical TV On the Radio fashion, with a deliberate, pounding drumbeat emerging from a quiet storm of electronic interference before a thundering bass line and churning guitars come crashing in.

Farrell, who’s been perfectly willing to toss off a provocative line or two in the past, sounds positively inspired as he bites into verses like, "You never really change like they say/You only become more like yourself/He thought he knew me back in the day/When I was down, but now it’s him crying help."

Navarro, who’s always been a Sunset Strip shredder at heart, gets his licks in, but he’s equally in tune with crafting sinuous hooks and layering dark textures of feedback and distortion. And somewhere in the mix, Perkins’ pounding percussion is abetted by Morocco’s Master Musicians of Joujouka. Sitek has a true talent for making the complex sound surprisingly simple, for pushing sonic boundaries in remarkably accessibly directions.

"Irresistible Force (Met the Immovable Object)," the second single, is practically a study in Sitek science. A sinister bassline circles a syncopated groove as synths and programming flutter and drone in the backdrop, and Farrell drops his voice an octave to offer an apocalyptic vision of romance.

"We didn’t know that it would blow up with such might," he intones, "We stars are even brighter/Contrasted with the night."

It may not be profound, but it’s more than effective. The tune takes a turn for the epic on a soaring chorus filled with swelling synths and looming power chords, and, after a Sitek synth solo, Navarro lets loose with what might be some of his most tasteful guitar heroics to date.

There are familiar echoes of classic Jane’s in the sordid story from the wrong side of romance that is "Twisted Tales," which finds Farrell playing the role of a less than honest lover who’ll say anything "to fit in, and yes get in bed with you."

And the acoustic guitar-based "Broken People" reprises some of the same mellow drama as "Jane Says," as Farrell declaims, "Welcome to the world/Welcome to the aching world/A woeful world of broken people." McKagan gets a writing credit here, but Sitek’s presence is still felt in the subtle atmospherics that accentuate the song’s pathos.

If imitation truly is the sincerest form of flattery, then I think I know how the guys in TV On the Radio are feeling right about now.

http://www2.the-burg.com/entertainment/ ... r-1392828/

[cursed male]

The Wrap Review: Jane's Addiction - The Great Escape Artist
18 October 2011

Jane's Addiction Sounds Like Second-Tier U2 in 'Escape Artist'

Here’s one way to cure fan addiction: Make ‘em wait eight years between releases, then return with an album as competent and forgettable as “The Great Escape Artist,” the long-in-coming latest from Jane’s Addiction.

The most remarkable thing about the band’s very belated fourth effort is how much, in songs like “Hit You Back,” they sound like second-tier U2 -- a comparison that wouldn’t have come up back in the group’s more ferocious ‘90s heyday.

Perry Farrell has toned down his formerly banshee-esque wailing for a more measured kind of pleading, and there are moments, especially in “Twisted Tales,” where he’s a dead ringer for Bono. Make no mistake, there are far worse rock & roll contemporaries to suddenly resemble as you’re trying to gracefully age into your early 50s.

But Dave Navarro is also emphasizing anthemic, Edge-style guitar lines over his former explosiveness. And with producer Rich Costey (who previously helped Muse sound like U2) giving the group a full-on Eno-ization, with hazy, reverb-drenched electronic enhancements, something’s missing. It’s not just bass player Eric Avery, though it’s regrettable that his always memorable bass lines have been replaced by serviceable work from studio guest Dave Sitek, of TV on the Radio fame.

“Escape Artist” is hardly a complete write-off. The set gets off to a promising start with its best and most thunderous track, “Underground,” where Navarro sounds like he’s been listening to the Edge and Jimmy Page (maybe influenced by a screening of “It Might Get Loud”?). “I’ll never give up the underground,” Farrell keeps repeating, sounding like a man who doth protest too much... though his equally emphatic “I’m a hustler!” admonitions suggest a certain degree of self-knowledge.

The Jane’s gang again manages to escape the ghetto of perpetual moodiness and murk with the closer, “Words Right Out of My Mouth,” which bookends the album with a turn-back-the-clock punk double-time climax. Sure, the song bears a silly spoken-word introduction that has Farrell talking to his therapist, setting up paranoid lyrics about “birds up in the trees!” that want to swoop down and eat his speech. But at least it ends the album with some adrenalin and (possibly intentional) humor.

What comes between those two highlights isn’t all that bad for a band entering its third decade, when surviving rock groups typically sound a lot more tired than these guys. Of course, that’s the needle-half-full angle on things.

However aficionados feel (and that’ll surely be mixed), newcomers aren’t likely to get hooked on anything in this eight-years-in-the-waiting effort. And the inability to make a compelling case to fresh fans is a pickle even Houdini would have a hard time squeezing out of.

http://www.thewrap.com/music/column-pos ... tist-31962

[cursed male]

Loudwire Review: Jane's Addiction - The Great Escape Artist
18 October 2011

Jane’s Addiction have been called many things since forming in Los Angeles way back in 1985, but prolific is not one of them. Over the course of a quarter-century, Jane’s have managed to release a grand total of just four studio albums — and that’s including their latest, ‘The Great Escape Artist,’ which drops today (Oct. 18). That said, don’t mistake that lack of quantity for an absence of quality.

When Jane’s Addiction first burst out of L.A. scene in the mid-’80s, there was nothing else like them. Combining arty bombast and epic guitar rock delivered through an intoxicating narcotic haze, Jane’s immediately offered an attractive alternative to the hair-metal then ruling the city’s Sunset Strip.

Their first two albums — 1988′s ‘Nothing’s Shocking’ and 1990′s ‘Ritual de lo Habitual’ — were considered instant classics, watershed discs that helped spawn the ’90s alternative movement even before people realized the movement was happening.

Fast forward two decades, and Jane’s are at it once again. Singer Perry Farrell and the band have reunited and again parted ways a several times, and the whole enterprise began to take on the feel of nothing more than an extended comeback tour, with the guys staying together just long enough to make one more album — 2003′s ‘Strays,’ a disc best known for featuring the ‘Entourage’ theme song..

With ‘The Great Escape Artist,’ Jane’s Addiction seem to have a focus on the present. Lead track ‘Underground’ kicks things off with an invigorating energy that announces the band’s renewed intentions, yet it’s still a song that could certainly hold its own next to the bulk of ‘Nothing’s Shocking.’ In fact, ‘Underground’ sounds like the monster ‘Shocking’ jam ‘Mountain Song’ recast as an angular, post-punk anthem, with swirling electronic flourishes and studio trickery thrown in for good measure.

Elsewhere, the aptly-named ‘Curiosity Kills’ finds JA experimenting with a melodic, post-industrial vibe — and the results are killer. Think mid-tempo Nine Inch Nails with tribal drums, soaring guitar solos from Dave Navarro and Farrell’s trademark vocals inflections. ‘I’ll Hit You Back’ shows what happens when they keep things concise; the straight forward verse-chorus-verse format, dense with harmony and synth, seems like a likely contender for next single.

Founding bassist Eric Avery passed on the chance to rejoin Jane’s in the studio this time around, and that may have been a good thing. Ex-Guns N’ Roses four-stringer Duff McKagan accepted an invite to take over, but lasted only a few months before stepping aside himself (he’s credited as co-writing three tracks). In came David Sitek of New York indie outfit TV on the Radio, a studio whiz who smudged his distinct sonic fingerprints all over ‘Escape Artist.’ Like the new electro-Jane’s sound? Thank Sitek.

Regardless of what you think of Sitek’s contributions, ‘The Great Escape Artist’ finds Jane’s Addiction in a good place: comfortable with their legacy as alt-rock innovators, yet willing to expand their sound and take it to new places.

4 / 5

http://loudwire.com/janes-addiction-the ... um-review/

[Larry B.]

The Wrap Review: Jane's Addiction - The Great Escape Artist
18 October 2011

Here’s one way to cure fan addiction: Make ‘em wait eight years between releases, then return with an album as competent and forgettable as “The Great Escape Artist,” the long-in-coming latest from Jane’s Addiction.

producer Rich Costey (who previously helped Muse sound like U2)

spot on.

[cursed male]

Consequence of Sound Review: Jane's Addiction - The Great Escape Artist
19 October 2011

Jane’s Addiction have always been a bit different. Actually, a lot different. That’s what made their last “comeback” album, 2003’s Strays, somewhat disappointing (though better than expected with 13 years of studio rust to shake off and no Eric Avery). Strays sounded more streamlined and straightforward, the band’s signature quirks and strange digressions between explosions not quite quirky or strange enough. Someone (producer Bob Ezrin?) had molded our canonized art-rockers into, gasp, a rock and roll band, an artistic faux pas akin to asking Jackson Pollock not to drip so much or surrealism-era Picasso to paint anatomically correct. Now, no reasonable Jane’s addict is expecting, or asking for, Nothing’s Shocking… Still or Ritual de lo Dos, but we do want our artsy boys to know that it’s okay to color outside the lines a bit… maybe even a lot.

Eight years, a Satellite Party, and a lot of guitarist mascara later, we find the L.A. alt-rock legends abandoning the sleek, steamrolling bluster of Strays in favor of further forays into frontman Perry Farrell’s preferred electronic realm. And while the DJ Peretz (another Farrell incarnation) leanings may have sent short-lived bassist Duff McKagan (Guns N’ Roses, Velvet Revolver) scrambling to find a heavier haven, The Great Escape Artist comes as a mostly welcome permutation.

The classic Jane’s rough edges have been smoothed out and coated in electronic confections, but there is a darker, grinding groove beneath that sonic sheen. Lead single “End to the Lies” meanders momentarily before bursting into a not-so-subtle personal put-down that rolls and roars with guitarist Dave Navarro’s more focused fare and Stephen Perkins’ absolutely mesmerizing drumming. “You talk about me so much that I think that you’re in love with me/Yeah, you do, it’s true, man, you’re busted, ” taunts Farrell, a barb he tops moments later by reminding, “You were the foreskin/I was the real head.” It’s brash, petty, and juvenile, and you get the sense that Farrell simply can’t help himself, which is fine. It’s the idiosyncratic and confrontational version of Farrell that gives this vendetta its verve.

Other standouts tap into a similar in-and-out grind, each with its own unique amalgamation of the album’s core elements. “Underground” combines atmospherics reminiscent of a subway tunnel, Navarro’s buzzing crunch and piercing incisions, and Farrell’s layered vocals into an album-opening shove that even briefly captures the tribal feel of primitive Jane’s. Backed by Perkins’ pounding, Farrell takes center stage on second single “Irresistible Force”, speaking, echoing, and flowing into a soaring chorus before abruptly tearing everything down with a coarse “Bangin’ and bangin’… together.”

However, not all of The Great Escape Artist fares quite so well. “I’ll Hit You Back” lacks the “danger” both Navarro and Perkins talked about trying to recapture on this record—that element of not quite knowing where things may go next. But how much peril exists when listeners can tell where all the trapdoors are? “Curiosity Kills” sounds utterly tame sandwiched between “End to the Lies” and “Irresistible Force”; repeated calls for something forceful, aggressive, and raw are met with only ho-hum responses, a problem that plagues other album tracks.

Jane’s round out things with perhaps the record’s two most unlikely inclusions. Aside from a glowing surge mid-song, “Broken People” features a minimally backed Farrell realizing that “you can’t help them out/They’ll break you in two,” a somewhat ironic statement given the song’s uplifting melody, though Farrell seems to have found peace in this conclusion. Closer “Words Right Out of My Mouth” opens with Farrell waxing about the notion of birds swooping down and stealing his voice before launching into the album’s lone barn burner. Neither track fits the album’s schema or ranks as a highlight, but Jane’s have always left room on their journeys for these curious, yet often beautiful, detours.

After repeated listens, The Great Escape Artist sounds more and more like an appropriate title for this record. Jane’s Addiction will probably never entirely escape the shadow of their seminal early albums (a Houdini-like feat, indeed), but by pushing so far in a new direction, in a way, they’ve escaped just enough. They’ve made it okay to get older, move on, and grow.

Essential Tracks: Underground, End to the Lies and Irresistible Force

3 / 5

http://consequenceofsound.net/2011/10/a ... pe-artist/

[cursed male]

WNCT Review: Jane's Addiction - The Great Escape Artist
19 October 2011

Jane's Addiction's "Great Escape Artist" Is Musical Magic

It's back to the record store once again. And this time, it's for a brand new album from one of the most creative and underrated bands in the entire music industry. Today's review is for the new album from alt-rock pioneers, Jane's Addiction. The band recently released its new album, "The Great Escape Artist". For those looking for something other than what's currently polluting the airwaves, "The Great Escape Artist" is a great escape.

Originality. It's something that the music industry has sadly lacked for well over a decade. Ever since the twentieth century turned to the twenty-first, music has become progressively boring and unoriginal. It's been next to impossible to find a band, group or artist to call an innovator. Thankfully though, with the relase of "The Great Escape Artist", one of the true originators of the alt-rock world has come to save the day.

It's been eight years since the release of Jane's Addiction's previous album, and over twenty since the band's self-titled debut. The irony of this is that "The Great Escape Artist" is only the band's fourth full length studio release. As much time as the band has taken between albums, one can't help but be amazed at how each album has been different from the other. And the band's latest is no exception. It's different from the band's previous three releases, and yet just as great a listen. It's a solid release from start to finish.

The album's opener, 'Underground' is kind of a classic/psychadelic rock piece with a modern era rock sensibility. Whether it's Dave Navarro's guitar work or the driving bass line of David Stick, or famed drummer Stephen Perkins' work, this is a great introduction to an album that Jane's Addiction fans and rock fans in general, have needed for a very long time. 'End To The Lies' is an interesting track in that lyrically, it's a scathing piece that on one hand could be the anti-love lost song. On the other hand, it coul be a rant against fake people in general. It's a song that actually has substance to it. And that includes the musical side, too. Musically, it's just as strong as 'Underground'. By the time that the album reaches 'Broken People', listeners might think that the band will just gently deposit them onto the shore on the other side of the musical world, with a new view on things. Ah, but wait. That's just long enough for audiences to catch their breath. That song is just a new beginning, if the band has anything to say about it. And the band does. As soon as its last strains end, the band gives listeners another kick in the pants, with the album's closer, 'Words Right Out of My Mouth'. Frontman Perry Farrell sings, "There's people on the ground/hungry for some beats to pound/don't need no bread/they just scream for a morsel of sound!/More sound!" That more sound is exactly what audiences get with this track. It's a good up-tempopunk-esque piece that reminds audiences one last time that while "The Great Escape Artist" may only be the band's fourth album, Jane's Addiction has proven once more that it can still be relevant and original, regardless of the times.

http://www2.wnct.com/blogs/reel-reviews ... r-1515353/

[Tyler Durden]

On Metacritic, Strays has 75...while TGEA currently has 45. Ouch.

[cursed male]

Metro Review: Jane's Addiction - The Great Escape Artist
14 October 2011

Jane's Addiction's The Great Escape Artist Swells with Confidence

Jane's Addiction provide a confident and adventurous example of what rock music should be as The Great Escape Artist album sounds just as good as their edgy debut 1988.

LA surely has a surplus of rock’n’roll hedonists and survivors but some bad boys (and girls) still seize attention.

Take Perry Farrell’s distinctly flamboyant rockers Jane’s Addiction, a band (including louche, rugged guitarist Dave Navarro) who have endured excesses and splits and wielded wild sounds since their 1988 debut Nothing’s Shocking.

Farrell remains a savvy showman and The Great Escape Artist (only their fourth LP) plays to his strengths.

There’s a fantastic swagger and smoulder to tracks such as End To The Lies and Broken People, and U2 bluster on Irresistible Force (Met The Immoveable Object). There’s also the promising addition of bassist/songwriter Dave Sitek of TV On The Radio.

The Great Escape Artist marks no radical revamp but it swells with confidence and dangerous intent.

4 / 5

http://www.metro.co.uk/music/reviews/87 ... confidence

[cursed male]

Soundspike Review: Jane's Addiction - The Great Escape Artist
18 October 2011

The First Completely Listenable Album from Jane's Addiction in More Than 20 Years.

Don't be fooled by the eight years between albums: like the green-kissed rebirth dance of spring eternal, or the stubborn persistence of bathroom tile mold, the three or four stalwart sailors who man the Good Ship Jane's Addiction never really lower the flag completely. They just wait.

Fans by now have become used to the band's infrequently regular reunion/recording/touring cycles, which have included almost half a dozen tours over the last 15 years, but only one album of new material. What they might not have been expecting is an album that sounds as coherent and contemporary as "The Great Escape Artist."

Plugging first former Guns N' Roses bass slinger Duff McKagan and then TV on the Radio's Dave Sitek into the bass slot vacated by departed founding member Eric Avery (who quit the band for the second time last year), the band summons itself into existence with a bellow -- "I'll never give up the underground," Farrell vows on the pulse-pounding opener, "Underground," which finds the singer in an almost restrained pitch. Guitarist Dave Navarro and drummer Stephen Perkins are also on an even keel on the opening track -- a trend that will carry through much of the record -- before Navarro rips off a classic fret-burning run late in the tune.

The album's first single, "End to the Lies," showed up back in April as a free download from the band's website, and retains its charms the second time around, casting a swirling maelstrom of sound around the curiously (and impressively) grounded Farrell. "You never change like they say," he offers in that oddly effective middle range, "you only become more like yourself."

Although the set's first two songs don't offer much in the way of growth beyond a moderately updated take on the classic Jane's sound, it's "Curiosity Kills" where the group begins to fully emerge into the light of 2011, revealing a slick modern sheen that retains the heart of the band's groove while almost moving it forward into a place of relevance. "Irresistible Force" also reaches for an updated sound but is weighed down by an unexciting chorus and lack of energy.

The rollicking, winsome "I'll Hit You Back" should have been the first single. It's merely "Been Caught Stealing" for a depleted age, sure, but the catchy chorus and insistent rock-o-matic beat (Navarro's chiming ten-second solo near the end flashes like the diamond handgrip of a concealed weapon -- it's just there to let you know he could do a lot worse to you) would be highlights on any Jane's record.

Elsewhere, "Twisted Tales" goes on a bit too long and suffers from flatness. "Ultimate Reason" doesn't sound like a Jane's Addiction song at all -- a listener might be alarmed that a Foo Fighters album slipped on by mistake at first.

But by "Splash a Little Water On It" we're back in Perryland for a grinding slog uphill in the rain. It's not quite "Three Days" -- nobody in this band (well, maybe Navarro) really has his heart in ten-minute songs about 72-hour-long threeways anymore-- but the measured culmination of the song's long, slow buildup reveals a lot about the maturity and experience that this crew has now. You're waiting for the spastic freakout, clanging and crashing and screaming, that never comes, but you realize at the end that you can do without it. It "ran a risk of being a 'lighters in the air' kind of song and now it's a 'lighter app in the air' kind of song," Navarro told an interviewer recently, and that about covers it.

But don't forget that this is still Jane's Freaking Addiction. Check "Words Right Out of My Mouth" if you don't believe it. For the first time Farrell is yelping in high register, the band is turning the amps up to eleven, and the foundations are beginning to shake. But even here the tilt is measured, coolly demonstrative rather than sneering and dismissive, almost elegantly in keeping with the overall theme of the album, which appears to be "old dogs learning new tricks."

This isn't 2003's "Strays," which featured a couple of decent songs amid a half hour of filler; "The Great Escape Artist" is the first completely listenable album, cover to cover, from Jane's Addiction in more than 20 years. And they didn't even have to give up the underground to make it.

http://www.soundspike.com/story/3143/al ... t-capitol/

[cursed male]

On Metacritic, Strays has 75...while TGEA currently has 45. Ouch.

There's only a handful of reviews for TGEA there at the moment so it's hardly the correct rating yet... Also RHCP's latest (crap of an) album has only 63 and many of those critics gave TGEA a better rating than they gave to I'm with You so...

[Tyler Durden]

On Metacritic, Strays has 75...while TGEA currently has 45. Ouch.

There's only a handful of reviews for TGEA there at the moment so it's hardly the correct rating yet.

TGEA has 14 reviews; Strays has 19. I don't think it's an unfair comparison.

[Essence_Smith]

People care too much about what other people think...

[cursed male]

TGEA has 14 reviews; Strays has 19. I don't think it's an unfair comparison.

Well, there's no denying that Strays was in general better reviewed than TGEA but considering that RHCP's I'm with You has 35 reviews the rating for TGEA isn't nowhere near the final figure at the moment.