Melvins – Thunderball (Ipecac Records)
Melvins 1983 refers to a band lineup that includes originator drummer Mike Dillard and King Buzzo (Buzz Osborne); they’ve had a few releases already. But for Thunderball, Osborne brought onboard British, Bristol-based experimental noise merchants Ni Maitres, as well as abstract electronicist Void Manes, who they toured with in 2019, and collaborated with on 2023’s THROBBING JAZZ GRISTLE FUNK HITS, the TG homage album.
The result is Thunderball, an album or an 12″EP, a 34 minutes body of mahi that is periphrastic in achieving its goal. Like most of Melvins music, there is rarely an ease to it, the listener is almost always challenged, conventions consigned, and thus coaxed ever so craftily to coalescence.
Compositions on Thunderball range from fractionally just over two minutes, to a touch over 11 minutes. Vomit Of Clarity is written exclusively by Ni Maîtres & Void Manes. At the same time, Short Hair With A Wig, the 11-minute extravaganza, fuses sonic elements of the aforementioned, into a classic Melvins arrangement. While Thunderball is a short experience, Dillard’s drumming style, reflective of an intonative approach, underscores the album heterogeneity in energy, pace and the ever present, ever expected Melvins mordant quality.
If I were a rich man… I would own everything created by Melvins on vinyl, I’m not, and with the ever-growing colossus Melvins catalogue not likely to cease & desist in the future, I find myself pernickety when shelling out my meagre baubles. However, Thunderball is an album I must have on vinyl, preferably the mustard gas version, and so should you!
Simon Coffey
Melvins – Thunderball is out now on Ipecac Records
