The Melvins

There is simply no doubt about it, the Melvins are the greatest band in the history of rock. No band has confounded genres like the Melvins: metal, rock, ambient, noise, country, pop, forget classifications, the Melvins are a genre onto themselves, distinguishable as much for their commitment to confuse everyone as their ability to actually pull it off, well, most of the time. Nowhere in the Melvins career was this more aptly demonstrated than in their recent Ipecac trilogy (The Maggot, The Bootlicker and The Crybaby), but never ones to rest on their laurels, the Melvins have turned their creative genius, not to the future, but to the past. First came the re-release of their seminal debut, Gluey Porch Treatments (Ipecac), an album so slow, heavy and viscous that it helped inspire a musical movement, and now comes their long-awaited Man's Run release, Electroretard. Comprised of re-workings of various Melvins songs and covers, Electoretard may initially seem like a stopgap release, but it's a far cry from a tide-over to the next full-length. While the covers are all exceptional, Pink Floyd's "Interstellar Overdrive," the Cows' "Missing" and the Wipers' "Youth of America," it's the reworked tracks that should interest the fans, not just die-hards. "Gluey Porch Treatments," "Revolve," "Tipping The Lion" and "Lovely Butterflies" all receive varied and disparaging re-interpretations, often emerging as recognisable but utterly different in the process. The standouts? "Revolve" becomes a whispered, understatedly urgent tune with modem-like solos juxtaposed over top and "Lovely Butterflies" becomes more repetitive and "rock," being reinterpreted with a live feel in mind and leaving the electronic drums and industrial feel of the original far behind. Still, with the exception of "Shit Storm," a noise collage of Melvins-like proportions, Electroretard is another brilliant offering from the twisted minds of the Melvins.