Mr. Bungle | Astoria, London - September 8 2000

Faith No More Followers
Sep 16
2 min read

Mr. Bungle performed their last two shows of the California tour before a twenty year hiatus in the UK. The first was at the Astoria in London, the second was at Rock City in Nottingham.

Kerrang! | 23 September 2000 | Simon Young

Every musical genre put in a blender and served up by Mike Patton's mob. KKK

WHEN EUREKA, a small Californian town, burped out Mr Bungle in 1985 - a High School band who took their bizarre monicker from a children's educational programme concerning bad habits - no one expected their baby-faced singer Michael Patton to go on to front one of the world's greatest bands, Faith No More. But it wasn't until after FNM had imploded that Patton turned Mr Bungle into a truly interesting unit.

Meanwhile he also created uneasy listening, avant-garde noise on the side, with the Fantômas, a band he formed with the Melvins' Buzz Osbourne and erstwhile Slayer skin pounder Dave Lombardo. Mr Bungle have now churned out three albums - their self-titled debut, 'Disco Volante' and last year's 'California'.

Seven musicians - alto saxophonist Theo Lengyel, tenor saxophonist/ clarinetist Clinton McKinnon, guitarist Trey Spruance, bassist Trevor Dunn, drummer Danny Heifetz and the rotund William Winant, a man Patton introduces as "the Winston Churchill of percussion" — wander onto the stage, immediately confounding the audience's expectations by launching into a sublime version of 'What The World Needs Now' by Burt Bacharach, sending shivers of excitement throughout the venue. And from then on it gets even more surreal, as Mr Bungle roll into 'My Ass Is On Fire', 'Desert Search For Techno Allah', 'Air Conditioned Nightmare' and a cacophonous blend of musical styles including Turkish pop, jazz, death metal and honest to goodness rock.

Patton's voice is amazing, even mimicking the high-pitched shrieking associated with Bollywood musicals.

While he commands presence on the stage cohorts (including Dunn who is dressed in

'Heidi-style' garb), the stop-start dynamics start to get frustrating.

So much so, a constant rain of beer cans narrowly miss his contorting frame. That said, LA2 was the original choice of venue for tonight's show, and the upgrade to its bigger brother is testament to the ongoing popularity of Patton, with many punters wandering around in vintage FNM T-shirts, eager to catch a glimpse of the voice behind 'Falling To Pieces' and 'Digging The Grave'.

But tonight's show is not about nostalgia. It's about music. But it's music of the weirdest, most confusing kind.

Set List

What The World Needs Now Is Love

None Of Them Knew They Were Robots

The Air-Conditioned Nightmare

Carry Stress In The Jaw

Ars Moriendi

I Feel For You

Travolta

Ei Raat Tomar Amar

My Ass Is On Fire

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