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It's 1994. Jim Martin has been fired from Faith No More via fax, Mr Bungle's Trey Spruance has taken his place on guitar, Roddy Bottum is absent from most the songwriting and King for a Day is the result. Note: This episode is pieced together from multiple recordings occurring between 19/3 - 2/4/20. This was to keep FNM news up to date. Any Covid-19 talk happened in the earlier phases and is already outdated. Please forgive anything that sounds like ignorance or misinformation. Email: podcastcroissant@gmail.com facebook.com/podcastcroissant Instagram - @podcastcroissant Twitter - @podcroissant fnmlive.com Bungle Fever faithnomorebook.com douglasesper.com Download MP3 (240 MB) #podcastcroissant #kingforadayfoolforalifetime #kfad25

Conan Neutron talks with Bill about Faith No More, Milk Cult, MC50 and the upcoming Talking Book II album Online podcast Protonic Reversal talks with the FNM bassist for an hour in an new interview on episode 149 of their show. Bill begins by discussing Talking Book II which is released on April 24th via Koolarrow. Then the host asks Bill about his brief work with Milk Cult in 1994 and with Jello Biafra in 2008. Bill also reveals a little on his touring time with MC50. The chat also gets on to Faith No More, "...I don't think we ever worked out any of our issues we're still as complex as we were the first time around. Sometimes it makes perfect sense, sometimes it doesn't." "There were a lot songs that never quite sat right. They were like 98% finished. When we came back and played them the second time we fixed them!" The host asks Bill about the many different guitar players, and the alchemy of the band. Bill reveals he's mixing the new Cómo Asesinar a Felipes album. You can pre-order Talking Book II on limited edition vinyl now HERE. #billygould #faithnomore #talkingbookII #koolarrow

The record label founded by Mike Patton and Greg Werckman has been 'making people sick' since April 1st 1999 Ipecac is a place for Patton to release his music, whatever the genre. It began with Fantômas and Maldoror. Tomahawk, Peeping Tom and Mondo Cane followed. Dead Cross, Corpse Flower are his latest releases, with the latest tētēma and the label's first Mr. Bungle release - re-recording of 'The Raging Wrath of the Easter Bunny' on their way. It's not all about Patton however Ipecac Recordings is home to some of the most innovative modern music available today. Just check out their Spotify playlist of 'almost everything we've put out'. Last year we celebrated Ipecac's 20th anniversary in style, we started by interviewing Greg himself. [Read the full interview] "Being best friends with Mike and working with Mike has been a great honor. He is a real artist. His focus and attention is 100% on the creative process. Sales, charts, interviews, photos, reviews, touring are not things that he worries about or cares for as much as the collaboration of creating something unique. Each year we get several requests from people that want to write a book about him or do a documentary about him and hundreds of people that want to interview him. Quite simply, there is nothing he dislikes more than talking about himself. Let the music represent him. Could he sell more records if he did more interviews or made a certain type of record over and over again? Yeah, I'm sure he could, but that is not who he is and I respect that." We also spoke to many of the artists who have released via the label. [Read the full tribute] "I have been a part of Ipecac Recordings since the release of their first album. When I first started working with Mike and Greg I was gifted not only great friends, but with complete creative encouragement. No labels or limits." - Dave Lombardo "Ipecac was initially created as a sort of haven for misfits, specifically Fantômas, at the time. The label continues to be a grassroots family whose business model is transparent. To be able to directly call and chat with the owners of the label about possible releases, licensing, distribution, etc is refreshing. And there are no inflated hopes about hit-making. It’s a very realistic place to launch one’s creativity." - Trevor Dunn Happy birthday Ipecac... #ipecacrecordings

Faith No More released their fifth studio album King For A Day Fool For A Lifetime Twenty five years ago in March 1995. Faith No More's album King For A Day Fool For A Lifetime did initially not find the same critical acclaim as it's predecessor when it was released in 1995. It received mixed reviews but has has since become revered by fans and critics alike. Here are a collection of reviews from major music publications all over the world. Kerrang! | February 1995 | KKKKK Keep The Faith! by Jason Arnopp Bay Area 'hangers produce their most eclectic album ever! Heaviosity reigns as the spectre of Big Jim is banished! FAITH NO More are a one-off. When guitarist Big Jim Martin left, we wondered if that magic chemistry had been lost forever. Not so. 'King For A Day...' is a work of utterly twisted genius. 'Get Out' has you bamboozled from the start - an up-tempo baby with unorthodox structures. The bastard smashes through your front door and makes off with the candlesticks before you can hear what the f**k Mike Patton's yelling about. Then first single 'Digging The Grave' rears up, and it sounds like Therapy? jamming with Anthrax. What's become of that trademark Bill Gould/Mike Bordin fat-bass-and-drums stuff? Answer: Faith No More have reinvented themselves. 1992's 'Angel Dust' was an oddball affair which grew like fungus with time. But it was the sound of a band making the most out of inter-band tension. 'King...' is the sound of rebirth. New guitarist Trey Spruance (since replaced by Dean Menta) was clearly a part of the song-writing, and shows a good ear for subtlety on the supercool 'Evidence', giving Roddy Bottum's keys a chance to breathe (or the first time. 'Ricochet' shows off the San Franciscans' inherent knack for dynamics, while 'Star AD' is a Disco Jazz freak-out with sexy sax, and 'The Velvet Hammer' offers the LP's most sober moment. 'Cuckoo For Caca'? It's that reliable track on a Faith No More disc when they go completely fish-mad and Bottum plugs in his Apocalyptic Church Organ Of Death! Actually, 'King...' features more spaz-fits than usual: witness Patton's shrieks on the brilliant 'Ugly In The Morning'! Didn't we expect this mania after his PE teacher-on-crack performance at '93's Phoenix Festival? The album's second half gets even stranger, as 'What A Day', 'The Gentle Art of Making Enemies' and 'Acoustic Groove (Recall)' spin your mind; Patton switching styles more than ever. He can be Jello Biafra, Leonard Cohen, the wobble-throated Patton we knew on 'The Real Thing', or the spawn of Satan. Last track 'Just A Man' fools the listener into thinking it doesn't have a chorus, before serving up one of the album's best. So, what’s the album's best refrain? Probably ‘Take This Bottle', seeing Patton back in his whisky-throated Country persona. If FNM had written '...Bottle' three years ago, they wouldn't have had to cover The Commodores' 'Easy'. Faith No More have created an album to keep them interested on the next mega-tour. If not sane... RAW Magazine | March 1995 4.5 out of 5 It's never boring with Faith No More. Only they would sack somebody as popular as 'Big Sick Ugly' Jim Martin and appoint a replacement without thinking to ask him whether or not he likes touring, but that's the nature of the beast. Although the five some's last album, 'Angel Dust', smacked of eccentricity for eccentricity's sake, at least it proved that the incredible success of 'The Real Thing' was no fluke, and that they had something of genuine interest to say. 'King For A Day ...' isn't as elaborate as its predecessor and, as an entire body of work, transpires to be less heavy than '... Dust' or '... Thing' - although it does have plenty of individual moments of gut-wrenching intensity. The pacy, rhythmic 'Get Out' is a rousing opener, blasting in and straight out again in two minutes and 14 seconds; no fuss or flab, just Mike Patton's inimitable bellow and some fiery guitar. The guitars, keyboards and dense backing vocals mesh together magnificently during 'Ricochet', before 'Evidence' steps down several gears, Patton crooning delicately over Roddy Bottum's entrancing keyboard work and a guitar that laps at the listener's earlobes like a wave on a Pacific island. Mmmm ... soothing. Unlike 'The Gentle Art Of Making Enemies', which features a crisp, driving riff that Metallica would be proud of. 'Star A.D.' is also pretty off-the wait, incorporating a delicious silver toned guitar, what sounds like the horn section from hell and some bizarre jungle chants. But, unbelievably, it works! If 'Star...' is a little on the strange side, 'Cuckoo For Caca' is absolutely f**king deranged. A bone-crunching riff gives way to some insane hollering during the verses, then to totally unintelligible gibbering at the chorus. And later, during 'Ugly In The Morning', Patton escalates into even more unfeasibly lunatic bouts of shouting, working himself up into a lather over a crazy, spiralling riff. Having seemingly reached the zenith of insanity, the band quietly retreat within their straight jacket for 'Caralho Voador', which sees Patton mumbling gently in Portuguese to some lounge lizard organ accompaniment. 'Digging The Grave' is probably far more what FNM fans crave, adding a hint of melody to the usual primal ferocity. Likewise, 'What A Day', which could almost be a an outtake from 'The Real Thing'. However, crammed in-between this pair comes 'Take This Bottle', a dirge-like ditty that would threaten even Pearl Jam on the Gloom-o-meter. So thank heavens for the deliciously sedate title track, which is best described by its ; working title of 'Acoustic Groove', but which features a lead vocal that sounds like that bald pillock from Right Said Fred! 'The Last To Know' also holds back on the throttle, giving! Trey Spruance the room for some chunky guitar chords, and even to rip out a Hendrix-style solo. Indeed, the closing track, 'Just A Man', shows how Jim Martin's departure has realty . allowed the band to stretch out. Brilliantly structured, with nary a power chord in sight, it's one of the band's finest moments. So FNM survive Big Jim's departure and emerge an equally angry, but certainly a better disciplined unit. Did anyone expect  any different?! Rolling Stone | June 1996 Al Weisel In 1989, just as morning in America was turning into the morning after, Faith No More released The Real Thing. Featuring the unlikely hit 'Epic' ("You want it all, but you can't have it"), the album perfectly summed up the era of discontent that was dawning. That genre-morphing collection seamlessly fused punk, heavy metal and progressive rock with soul and rap and was a harbinger of alternative music to come from the likes of Pearl Jam, the Red Hot Chili Peppers and Nine Inch Nails. But like Gorbachev, Faith No More was subsumed by the revolution they helped make possible. Their follow-up, Angel Dust, a wildly uneven, self-consciously odd album, was a huge disappointment. Saying King for a Day, Fool for a Lifetime is not as disjointed as Angel Dust is like saying Eve was not as fractured as Sybil because she had fewer personalities. From the Spandau Ballet-like blue-eyed soul of 'Star A.D.' to the thrash metal of 'Ugly in the Morning' to the Latin rhythms of 'Caralho Voador' (on which singer Mike Patton coos in Portuguese à la João Gilberto), the album is almost desperately eclectic. The Real Thing's genre hopping was effortless. Despite the loss of guitarist Jim Martin (his replacement, Trey Spruance, a more conventional, less interesting metal guitarist, left the band after recording this album) and a number of weak cuts like the campy 'Just a Man' and the dreadfully silly 'Cuckoo for Caca' ("Being good gets you stuff/Being stuff gets you good"), Faith No More's brilliance does shine through at moments. Among the best cuts are 'Ricochet,' a portentous anthem reminiscent of 'Epic'; 'Digging the Grave,' which has a grungy feel that isn't completely ruined by Patton's histrionic screaming; 'Take This Bottle,' a country alchy ballad worthy of George Jones; and 'King for a Day,' a haunting reverie anchored by Roddy Bottum's atmospheric keyboards. One hopes that that last song's moving chorus – "Don't let me die with this silly look in my eyes" – doesn't prove to be Faith No More's epitaph. Metal Hammer | March 1995 Menacing by Pippa Lang Faith No More. as we know, have no problems with inhibitions. In fact. it's become their privilege to take risks. but how does any band gain maturity if, at the time, they need to retain that sense of reckless adolescence? Hear 'King For A Day...Fool For A Lifetime' and you might just grasp the method. On this, the Jim Martin-less FNM have almost reached an indefinable peak when a band becomes a slave to its own eclectic talents because it's too easy not to. Although there's something disappointing about the first two tracks - 'Get Out' is straightforward, rapid-fire FNM heaviness, 'Ricochet' a predictable FNM clone start with the smooth, smoochy in its own right? This venture into the outer limits of FNM's musicality disturbing to say the least - if you thought 'I'm Easy' was a one-off, you were wrong! But disturbing is what FNM are, and there's plenty to feed the deranged brain, whilst also realising that the band have become almost too smart for their own good. They are probably capable of anything. Although 'King For A Day.. .Fool For A Lifetime' may not be as ugly as 'Angel Dust', there is always Mike Patton's penchant for gibbering lunacy. When he goes for it, he goes for it in fine. ahem, angel dust for 'Cuckoo For Caca'. On tracks like this and the totteringly mad 'Ugly In The Morning' (and, as a reference point, most of 'Angel Dust'), Patton turns into a non-repentant, almost cruel and wholly malevolent child. But unlike 'Angel Dust', there is much more to 'King For A Day..' than that. So FNM have retained their inimitable sense of mischief, but the ease with which they pivot from one genre to the next boasts a maturity that they may not have been able to achieve with Jim Martin. Would Martin, for example, have approved of the smooth Mehicano pastiche this is 'Caralho Voador', with Patton's sexy-in-a-cabaret sort-of-way vocals? Or the smoochy 'Just A Man'? Probably not. It appears that Patton, in particular, has spread his wings magnificently since Martin's departure, turning from Tom Waits into Warren Zevon - from the blackest white voice you've ever heard into the smoothest crooner this side of Engelbert Humperdinck. Martin would probably have wholeheartedly supported the syrupy, Sabbath-esque 'The Last To Know' and the almost Queensrychian drama of 'Digging The Dirt'. But both these two, excellent in their FNM styling that they are, are not the band's that collective brain of theirs, how could they possibly sit still? With a vocalist who will end up being compared to Ozzy Osbourne and Tom Waits in eccentricity, and a musicality that's fast turning them into recognised 'musos', FNM are of serious interest not just to our genre, but to all genres. NME | February 1995 Shit Sandwich by Ted Kessler Imagine friends, that you are Mike Patton or Roddy Bottum. It is 18 months since you last played live, nearly three years since your last album, the well crafted though strained 'Angel Dust'. You've made a new record at last, you've shed your group's least appealing feature (some accolade in FNM!), irksome guitarist Big Jim Martin, but still you can't get it up for the group. You'd rather, if you're Mike, be hanging out with your new missus - you always were the hardest to pin down to FNM anyway and now it really is a labour of love. If you're Roddy, well, you were way out there when the rest of the group made 'King', strung out, tied up and only making the barest contribution, so you don't feel that much of an attachment to Faith No More at the moment, you'd rather be doing things with your other group, Star 69. Which must be weird because it was your way with an askew tune that blasted FNM out past their more doughy contemporaries in the first place. And now they're just a group you're probably only going to be playing with. So what rose-tinted specs must you don each morn to find purpose in your work when you're as jaded as the two core members of Faith No More? How close to extinction must you be before actually realising that hauling a record as lame and half-arsed as 'King' around the world is the final act you perform as a group? For there's no escaping the stench of last-gasp lucre and contractual obligations that hangs over FNM's fifth album. This is a nasty, vitriolic record made by angry men - but angry primarily at themselves. Angry at themselves for having to make another record with each other, angry at the way they've turned what once made them stand out in dramatic relief from the stodge of the likes of living Colour into cliche. On much of ‘King’ they merely sound like a parody of themselves. You know this because a couple of times they pull their finger out and remind us of the lateral FNM thinking that made them so ace (remember how threatening they made The Commodores ‘Easy’ sound?). 'Evidence' is an eerie, laid-back piano motif that sounds like the kind of thing serial killers unwind with at the end of a long day. “I didn't feel a thing/You didn't mean a thing," moans Patton through the chorus, softly reminding you why you're glad you're not his neighbour. And on the closing ‘Just A Man' they broaden the scope even further to embrace a huge soul sound with sweeping strings and chunky backing vocals. Sure, close your eyes and you're involved in one of Kari Wallinger's nightmares, but that’s the kind of place FNM work best: terrorising the mainstream. These slackers do not sustain this level of imagination throughout, unfortunately opting to merely pound away at a trashy, operatic approximation of their former metal glories. ‘Ugly In The Morning' and 'Cuckoo For Caca' steam eyes shut, head down in that direction with the first single, ‘Digging The Grave' is an ugly flailing squall garbles nothing very loudly. And let’s be honest Mr Billy Gould, even you must be sick of those super-fast, twiddly bass contortions now. Ultimately, 'King For A Day...' is the sound of a group shrugging and asking, grumpily, "Will this do?". They're not sure why they've made it or what you're supposed to do with it, but, hey, it's finished now: wanna buy it? The only justice to be had for this flagrant waste of talent Is when imagining how bored they're going to be with these songs after six months on the road. Heh heh heh. Spin Magazine |  May 1995 Jonathan Gold 6 out of 10 What seems like several thousand years ago, before Lolla-palooza, in the days when Kurt Cobain was probably still working out Kiss songs on his guitar, Faith No More was the king of "alternative" rock. It was SPIN's Artist of the Year toward the end of the palaeolithic age, a genre-busting post-punk art-rock band whose music veered abruptly between Rush, Metallica, and Devo. And though it's hit 'Epic' may sound tame after a few years of Beck and the 69 Boyz, at the time, it may have been the rawest single to break into Billboard's top five. But it's last album, Angel Dust, kind of tanked, and its last hit, a rather too faithful rendition of the Commodores' 'Easy,' nudged the group over to a cramped corner of VH-1-land. On King For A Day, though, the band reinvents itself with a deftness last seen when the Red Hot Chili Peppers signed on producer Rick Rubin and learned to write a hook. Faith No More let go lemuresque guitarist Jim Martin and temporarily picked up Trey Spruance from singer Mike Patton's side project, Mr. Bungle. It abandoned long-time producer Matt Wallace in favour of Andy Wallace (who mixed Slayer's Reign In Blood and Nirvana's Nevermind), and the album's sound has the burnished, jackhammer-sheathed-in-a-lubricated-condom presence of Wallace's best work. Patton has finally abandoned his adenoidal Dickies whine for a more nuanced Jello Biafra-as-Tom Jones thing, which works better than you might think. Though the music still careens from genre to genre as casually as most bands go from chord to chord--there's a song here for every radio format, and you may grow to despise the "Sukiyaki"-flavoured blue-eyed-soul song 'Just a Man' --King for a Day is never less than coherent, which is more than you can say for Primus. On a few songs, Faith No More may be the first band to surgically join the Bay Area speed-metal crunch chords of bands such as Metallica and Testament with the kind of simply pop melodies Mariah Carey might feel comfortable singing. On parts of King for a Day, Faith No More does for speed metal what REO Speedwagon did for the regular kind of metal more than 20 years ago. And I mean that, I guess, as a compliment. Raw Magazine| September 1995 Who's Fooling Who by Neil Jeffries Is this mad or what? Five months after the original album release, London Records are re-releasing 'King For A Day, Fool For A Lifetime' - plus four B-sides and five, six-minute interviews, one with each band member - as a boxed set of seven 7" EPs... Cynics (and there are always cynics at times like these) would have to say that this is an unlikely way to attract new Faith No More fans and so the potential customers are almost certainly the people who already purchased one of the normal formats as well as the single B-sides. And what about those fans and collectors who want the interviews, but can't play vinyl? London Records should and do - know that even for rock fans, vinyl is an increasingly unpopular minority medium to collect. But rather than race on up to the moral high ground and spit fire and brimstone down on London Records, let's retrace the story of the music. 'King For A Day...' (first reviewed in RAW 170) is easily in terms of songwriting and performance - Faith No More's best album. Although it may be less Instantly appealing than their 1989 breakthrough, 'The Real Thing', it is surely destined to be recognised as far superior. If all was fair in the world of rock 'n' roll, it would already be a massive hit. But it ain't. It has sold okay in the UK and Germany, but pretty much stiffed in the States. How come? Perhaps FNM fans were so disappointed by the uncomfortably varied highs and tows of their last album - the angst-ridden 'Angel Dust', made as much as an antidote to 'The Real Thing' as a natural followup - that they didn't trust its eventual successor. Perhaps they were put off by the change in line-up, but FNM knew they had to improve or implode. Getting rid of guitarist Jim Martin prevented the latter and the hiring of guitarist Trey Spruance to record the album signalled the former. His playing on 'King For A Day...' added a new dimension to Faith No More's already eclectic sound. His subsequent refusal to commit to touring and his replacement with Dean Menta (who worked only on the B-sides that are now part of this package) was a strange step forward - even in the Twin Peaks-like world of Faith No More. But 'strange' is what floats their boats and besides - amidst all this smokescreen sat the album itself, awaiting and deserving serious attention. It has to be said, this bizarre new format doesn't make it any easier, with the running order completely revamped and interrupted by interviews and less worthy tracks (especially 'I Wanna F**k Myself’) but then who, in all honesty, will bother to play all seven discs one after the other anyway? The cynics are, of course, right. This is purely an exercise in marketing, hoping the fans' devotion stretches to wanting to hear Bill Gould conclude that the album is "like a cabinet" or Patton talk sensibly - honest! about how individual ideas "get raped" by the rest of the band. Roddy is thoughtful, deep and intelligent, Mike Bordin is irrepressibly enthusiastic, while Dean Menta tells the best story: But the truth is that the interviewer follows a predictable line of questioning and the answers will quickly pale in their interest. Of much more lasting value would be a discussion of why London didn't flex its marketing muscle a little more effectively five months ago and make the original album the hit it so richly deserves to be. Access Magazine | 1995 4 out of 5 Tim Henderson The exit of fun-loving socialite guitarist 'Big Sick Ugly' Jim Martin last year left a neutral yet staggering Faith No More with all guards down and a silence within the ranks. Alongside the rather bizarre follow-up (Angel Dust) to the band's cross-over revelation--1989's The Real Thing--the band had seen (and looked forward to seeing) brighter days. Martin has since been replaced by former Mr. Bungle axe man Trey Spruance (who recorded King...then left) and more recently, ex roadie Dean Menta, who's prepared to take FNM's long-overdue tour commitments to the hilt. King is the record FNM had to make. Focused, tender, crushing and emotionally straining. From the instant gems 'Ricochet' and 'Caralho Voador'[??] to the underlying humour of 'Take This Bottle' and pounding 'Ugly in the Morning', King is assured to land FNM back on their feet. Apart from front-man Mike Patton's annoying tantrum-shrieks, the band has rounded off the edges of extremity that made them a household name with 'Epic'. Well-executed and long-winded leaves the listener a hearty chunk to chew on, but the ensuing digestion is assured to please the palate. Sputnik | 2007 4 out of 5 In short King For A Day... Fool For A Lifetime is an excellent album. It is by no means perfect, but Faith No More were one of the greatest left field rock acts of the 90's and this album is one of their very best. I would aim this one at the discerning rock/metal fan wanting to try something different, most of the album leans towards a straight rock/metal sound in comparison to much of their other work but the branching off into other genres along with the blending of sincerity and absurdity make for some strange turns. This is a band that has the ability to open doors musically for people. All Music Greg Prato 3.5 out of 5 Long-time Faith No More guitarist Jim Martin split from the band under less-than-amicable circumstances in 1994. Consequently, the group hired Trey Spruance (the guitarist from Mike Patton's other band, Mr. Bungle) to handle six-string duties for 1995's King for a Day, Fool for a Lifetime. While it wasn't exactly the mind-bending masterpiece that 1992's Angel Dust was, it was easily their most musically straightforward album and was another challenging, exceptional release. As on Angel Dust, Patton truly shines on vocals, as he tackles any genre put in front of him -- romantic love songs (the soulful smooth funk of 'Evidence'), bile-spitting rants of hate ('The Gentle Art of Making Enemies'), cacophonous freak-outs ('Ugly in the Morning'), gospel (the light-hearted album closer, 'Just a Man'), and breezy pop ('Caralho Voador'). But there was also plenty of FNM's signature heavy sound to go around -- the furious opener 'Get Out,' 'Ricochet,' 'Cuckoo for Caca,' 'Digging the Grave,' 'The Last to Know,' and the almost progressive title track. While Spruance did a masterful job of filling in the shoes of an integral founding member, he abruptly split from the band himself on the eve of the album's ensuing worldwide tour (replaced by roadie Dean Menta). King for a Day, Fool for a Lifetime remains one of Faith No More's underrated releases. Ultimate Guitar | 2008 9.5 out of 10 Overall, this album finds a nice middle ground between Angel Dust and Album of the Year. Although it could never live up to the intensity of Angel Dust, this album is a lot more approachable and doesn't disappoint. If this was to be looked upon as the usual rock album, it would sound disastrous. But the experimental talent of Faith No More has shown us over the years about how risky and unique an album can afford to be and still have the intensity. This was the Faith No More album that has gotten me into their music, and from a musician point of view, this album (along with other FNM albums) goes to prove how a band can synchronise and synthesise awesome and unique music. If my copy was stolen, I would happily purchase another one, because FNM is something no one should miss. Thanks for reading. Livewire | May 1995 Resembling no other fantastical FNM opus, King For A Day is nevertheless a return of sorts to conventionally instrumentalised rock songs, back to (oxymoronic) prog-funk basics, chugging guitars, manic grooves, melody-pegging keys, swirling and thrashing smartly beneath a suave, unsettled and stellar Mike Patton performance. And suave is definitely the set-up on such smarmy, r&b-tinged complex-ballads as Take This Bottle, Just A Man and the melancholic title track, songs that are easy to love, that drink-ability carrying into the itchy, perky, bombastic rock numbers too, solidifying a record with an intellectual but toned-down character, peaceable agitation, busy buzz on neurotic simmer. The crazy professors have hatched an enigmatic one here, in remission from the insanity of ANGEL DUST, rediscovering THE REAL THING, but sawing off the edges to load up the layers, a kind of world-weary loungy maturity when mellow and introspective, which is nearly half the record. And when heavy, the band moshes on pins and needles, churning out the decibels only inches from Anthrax, finding punk-funk that manifests itself as sturdy face-flung-forward songs. Executive summary: artists off-the-rails harnessing the mania for something altogether rational. #faithnomore #kingforadayfoolforalifetime #kfad25

Members of Mr. Bungle have confirmed that they have re-recorded their 1985 demo with Scott Ian and Dave Lombardo We have been speculating for the last few weeks since the live Raging Wrath Of The Easter Bunny shows that Mr. Bungle were in fact in the studio recording the tracks for an updated release. Now the band have given Revolver the exclusive news that they're re-recording The Raging Wrath of the Easter Bunny, along with a selection of covers and three previously un-recorded songs. (It remains to be determined which tracks will actually make the final forthcoming new album.) Scott Ian says of the project, "Holy crap — the songs sound so great! Every day at the studio is like Christmas morning for me — each song we finish another present. I don't know if I'm more excited about this record as a fan of Mr. Bungle or as a member of Mr. Bungle. Either way, I can't wait for the world to hear it." Revolver have published an exclusive studio report with some fantastic photos. In part one they have spoken with Trey Spruance about the recording process in a great interview available in full HERE. "...we started hanging out again and doing music together — Trevor, Mike and I — about 10 years ago. That was obviously way after the band broke up in 2001 or whenever it was. So we've been meeting up and doing stuff for 10 years. We never felt like there was a pressing need to do a Bungle reunion, but we were hearing about it all the time. We knew people wanted us to do it, but we were kinda looking at each other, like, "Should we?" We felt like if it wasn't coming out of us naturally, what the fuck are we doing? Maybe we should be thinking about our legacy more than doing a reunion just to do it. So we didn't do it." "We knew we were gonna do the shows and resurrect the band for that, but we didn't really have solid plans for the future. In fact, when the idea first came up, we weren't even sure we were gonna call the band Mr. Bungle. We thought we should call it The Raging Wrath of the Easter Bunny. But then, over time, we all realized that when bands do reunion tours and go back to their roots, it usually means playing some blues or something. For us, this is really Mr. Bungle. This is our beginnings. This is the heart and soul of the band." Part 2 will be published tomorrow (March 24th) Photos by Husky Hoskulds #mrbungle #mikepatton #treyspruance #davelombardo #trevordunn #scottian #ragingwrathoftheeasterbunny

Faith No More's fifth studio album was released twenty five years ago in March 1995. The Making Of King For a Day Fool For A Lifetime This is the story of how Faith No More's compelling and brilliant fifth album King For a Day Fool For A Lifetime was recorded. This article was written with the help of the band, referencing interviews with band members and those who were involved. To Create You Must First Destroy The friction between five diverse personalities that created the outstanding album Angel Dust was not going to facilitate a further Faith No More record. Touring during '92 and '93 had divided the band into two enemy camps - Mike Patton, Mike Bordin, Bill Gould and Roddy Bottum verses guitarist Jim Martin. The final gig this incarnation of the band would play was the UK’s Phoenix Festival in July '93. “The last gig we did was the Phoenix festival. When we came home, especially me, Bill, and Mike realized that what we'd done on 'Angel Dust' was actually pretty cool and it worked really good. There was stuff we could continue doing. We wrote some songs, and a couple months after that we played them to Jim. We asked him, 'Hey, what are you gonna put on this?' It's always been us writing a framework and he's thrown parts on top of it. It was obvious that it wasn't working. It was impossible, but we gave it a chance to see what would happen. Because we knew it would be a big hassle to do this, not only legally but time-wise." – Bill 1995 | Metal Hammer Consequently, after eleven years FNM ended their relationship with the biggest sickest and ugliest member by fax in the November of '93. “Jim’s always said he quit. He didn’t. I fired him by fax. It was the only way of getting hold of him! Getting rid of him was a real cleansing exercise. There’s no point keeping someone in the band who’s only there for the money or something. Jim wasn’t committed to what the band wanted to do. I’m good at sacking band members. And by fax was such a… 90s way of doing things.” – Roddy 2001 | Metal Hammer Journalist and friend of the band Steffan Chirazi quickly picked up the story ending his book, The Real Story published in 1994, with a ‘stop the press’ chapter explaining the split. "We have definitely parted company. I think anybody who's read the music press over the past year, even two years, shouldn't be too surprised with what's happened. "The situation just came to a point where it was impossible to work together, and we wish Jim all the luck in the world with whatever he does. We don't plan on working with him any time soon. “ – Bill 1994 "Faith No More, as you know it, is no longer. I believe the fact that we (always) went in different ways musically was actually an integral part of the band. "I am still writing songs working on music as I have been throughout most of my life - and will continue to do so. Hopefully, I will see you all soon." – Jim 1994 Rather than dwell on losses Bill provided encouraging words to fans of FNM. "We're writing an awesome record and it's nearly written.In some ways, it won't be as drastically different as people probably expect.” – Bill Gould 1994 However, moving on as a unit would prove to be difficult. Roddy was facing altogether different demons - his battles with heroin and the death of his father made him absent from the rehearsal room. “… things for me personally were going to hell. I came out. I saw some friends die. I was with Courtney Love throughout Kurt’s final months ‘cos she was a close friend and at the same time my own father died. I just holed up and had a nervous breakdown basically. I just realised I had to chose my priorities very carefully. Things like honesty and passion and art. But whilst the album was being recorded, all of that is a real blur for me ‘cos of the shit I was going through at the time. And my heroin addiction didn’t help. And the suicide of two of my friends didn’t help. Nothing helped. Things had to reach a low before I could help myself. My first impulse was to leave. But I couldn’t just let it go, it was something I helped start, it’s very important to me.” – Roddy 2001 | Metal Hammer Without Roddy or a guitarist, the songs developed much differently to those on Angel Dust, also the band’s approach was specifically different. "In some ways, it won't be as drastically different as people probably expect. The song writing process on this record is the same as it has been throughout. The difference is that we're looking to strip some fat, get some nice, short, to-the-point songs. Coming off touring the last album for a year-and-a-half, which we liked a lot, we felt the need for quick, to-the-point songs. Which is what we're doing. It'll be more immediate, and it's our priority to make the best album we can and be as efficient as possible." – Bill 1994 | Kerrang! "It was definitely less tense recording the album, but writing it maybe not. I mean, we wrote most of it without a f**king guitar player! At the same time, that situation (Jim Martin's sacking) made us like a free agent: it allowed us to sleep around with as many people as we could. And I suppose the end result is more harmonious, does sound like a unit... I don't know, maybe we were getting along this time!" – Patton 1995 | Meat With the song writing well on its way FNM now had to find the right guitar player. Justin Broadrick from Godflesh and Ralph Spight from Victims Family were both considered. As was Killing Joke's Kevin ‘Geordie’ Walker. "He’s a great guitar player. One of the best I’ve ever seen.He would have been amazing, but he is so distinctive. I think he would have rendered us into a Killing Joke cover band." – Bill 2015 | Small Victories Ultimately the band turned to Mr. Bungle’s Trey Spruance, some would think this an obvious choice. "We knew we had songs that worked. We tried out a lot of guitarists and Trey definitely understands our language. He had his own very capable language and is able to lock into what we're thinking too. It's exciting to be able to finally get in and do the album we've been waiting to do all this time." “If anything, we did everything possible to convince ourselves that he wasn't the right guy. Patton had said that Trey was going to be our man, but he didn't even want to deal with the idea. He's known him for years and the last thing he wanted was to be in another band with him, but in the end we were hurting ourselves by avoiding him so hard. For a long time it was too obvious, and we were fighting the obvious - but there comes a time where you have to realise who the right guy for the job is." – Bill 1994 | Kerrang! However, it was a match that was Mike Patton resisted. "I was actually against it. You don't wanna be too much with someone. It gets a little incestuous. It was like we'd been married for a few years and now we could go and fuck our brains out and play with some other people. It was like being reborn. It was liberating. I'd had some bad water under the bridge with him and I didn't wanna be in another aggravating situation. But you do what's best for the music." – Patton 1995 | Metal Hammer At this point the core of FNM had twenty incomplete songs for Trey to work on. He added not only guitar ideas to the demos but also attempted to fill the gap left by Roddy and turned in some keyboard parts. “…it was pretty much like, Here are some songs with just drums and bass. Add some guitar parts and we’ll see. They liked what I did, so that was cool. A bit unexpected. I added keyboard parts to some of those demos, because I always naturally thought of the role of Faith No More guitar parts as being kind of minimal pieces of a puzzle working in conjunction with everything.” – Trey 2015 | Small Victories “He has a really good ear for writing stuff, he has a really good ear for what sounds great, he understands keyboards really well, the bonds between keyboards and guitars, and he’s really diverse. We’ve never wanted to limit ourselves to one particular kind of music or one particular anything. And it was clear from the start that Trey was the same way.” – Roddy 2015 | Small Victories Controlled Cabin Fever Having secured a guitarist FNM now looked at a change of producer. Matt Wallace had grown with the band producing every release from early pre-FNM recordings to 1992’s Angel Dust. The collaboration had developed an unmistakable sound, but for this record both Matt and the band felt new direction was needed. “After Angel Dust, I felt like I had taken the band as far as I could. Maybe with a different producer, maybe they could go further. It was an act of love, for lack of a better phrase, where I just thought I wanted to let them run free.” – Wallace 2015 | Small Victories Enter Andy Wallace, no relation the Matt, who’s credits included Nirvana‘s Nevermind, Slayer and Run DMC. “…we used a new producer to get a new set of ears. Andy had worked with Slayer, Sonic Youth, and Nirvana, and we knew what we wanted from him – a simpler, more acoustic, more punctuated sound than we’d had in the past. That in combination with a new guitarist kind of gave things a real up-in-the-air, what the fuck is gonna happen kind of feel. And it was the album that decided whether FNM would continue.” – Roddy 2001 | Metal Hammer Andy used Bearsville studio for all his work, an isolated live-in facility near Woodstock in upstate New York, so the band flew up there in September 1994 and settled in to living in their appointed wooden cabins. "Oh my God, kids, there's not much to do out there in Bearsville, nothing with a capital 'N'! It'd be Saturday night and we'd hear the crickets chirping in the woods. The most entertaining thing that happened to me was I caught pneumonia, which kept me from being stir-crazy for about a week. The sickness debilitated me to the point where I lost my cabin fever!” – Gould 1995 | Kerrang! There is no doubt the surroundings contributed to the sound of the album. "We usually record in San Francisco and there's always distractions. I have to pay my parking tickets or some bullshit, show up late, people are running in and out, friends come over.... but this was cool. The studio's out in the middle of the fucking forest. It's on this dirt road, there's just this studio and a cabin for two miles. It's just like sensory deprivation. But the good thing about it was we had nothing else to do but record. We actually tried to stay in the studio as much as we could, because if we left the studio there was nothing to do." – Gould 1995 | Axcess Songs That Can Tear Down The Stars The songs on KFAD are radically different to that of it’s predecessor AD. More aggressive, punchy, stripped down and much shorter in length. Yet familiar extremes remain from brutal rock songs to passive easy listening from dramatic overtures to dark and brooding alt-rock. Patton’s lyrics contain less character sketches and are charged with self-loathing. “We didn't really have any concept or idea. We don't know what it is we do, we just know how to do it. It would be pointless for us to sit down and have a career discussion on what we should sound like or where we should take this next record. It's kind of like if we're feeling it it's going to come out a certain way. Yet we all knew that we wanted to make a record with short, concise statements--three minute songs and that's just it. To analyze it or come up with a plan or philosophy would kind of kill it for us." - Patton 1995 | Meat “By the time of ‘King For A Day’ we’d had some difficult times, and we knew that if and when we did it, this was gonna be the record of our lives. It had that all-or-nothing feel to us. Instead of putting everything into every song, we wanted to take things out and make them a bit simpler. Perhaps that’s what you’d call a ‘pop’ or lighter feel. All the loud songs turned out really great on this album, really aggressive, and we’ve always done that really well. But the smoother songs I’ve never felt we’ve gotten exactly right. And this one is pretty damn close to being exactly right. It’s like when a certain member has an idea, and he’s a little embarrassed over it, you know there’s gotta be something good about it, it’s gotta be worth doing. We’re just not the kind of band to say ‘never’. I would say we wouldn’t ever do something, because we’d do it just to fuck each other up.” - Bordin 1995 | Metal Hammer "Ha ha. Oh my god! My favorite thing, especially on this record, is to write lyrics and not tell the band what I'm singing, and then have them guess what I'm singing. Usually they go, 'Are you saying what I think you're saying?' and it's better than what I wrote. So I just use what they wrote instead. Instead of the word 'horn' it's supposed to be 'hole', and 'came' is not in there either. But I didn't wanna correct you, because it's just too beautiful." - Patton 1995 | Metal Hammer Get Out Music and Lyrics Mike Patton Keeping with FNM tradition the album opens with an immediate sensory attack, all guns blazing. This song was entirely by Patton and saw members of the band adapting to his particular writing style. At only two minutes seventeen seconds it confirms the intention of FNM to deliver short statements. "Patton thinks in a way that I wouldn't it's actually good for me because I would never have done what I end up doing. When you move your fingers in a way that you wouldn't normally, and you get used to it and it becomes natural, then you have a whole new way of going about things. For example, the song 'Get Out' on our last record, he did the bass part and I'm thinking, What the hell is that? What notes is he playing? Why would anybody want to even think of that?' I learned it and realised it was actually really simple, just a different- way of looking at playing the instrument." – Bill 1995 | Bassist Magazine Ricochet Music Gould, Bordin, Patton Lyrics Patton Released as the second single from the album, unbelievably this song almost didn’t make the cut, but was included at the insistence of Mike Bordin. The video to accompany the single release was directed by Alex Hemming and featured footage filmed during the band's show at Paris’s Élysée Montmartre. "That's my favourite song. I was sort of a fuckin' weasel, and... that wasn't gonna be on the record, but that song turned out so great that it pushed another song off the record. I think it sounds great, I love that song. I really love the choruses, where it gets really big, and it really takes off... I love that song. And that was the last song we wrote, as well. That was the 20th song that we wrote for this record. So I think it's really fitting that the first song that we wrote for the record and the last song that we wrote are both on it." – Bordin 1995 | Kerrang! The noticeable lyric ‘running twice as fast to stay in the same place’ resembles a line from Lewis Carol’s Alice Through The Looking Glass. It is often discussed whether the lyrics refer to the death of Kurt Cobain – the working title for Ricochet was Nirvana and the words could certainly be compared to the circumstances of Cobain's suicide. "It was written the day that Kurt died. That's just why it was called "Nirvana." (Pause.) I like that one. The vocal harmonies are really great. And those are my favourite lyrics on the record." – Roddy 1995 In February 1995 Mike Patton addressed the meaning of his lyrics with NME. Several lyrics on 'King' seem to snarl against the trap of celebrity, entrapment and the ageing process. But Patton dismisses any suggestion that the Kurt Cobain saga had any effect on him ("I didn't know him or anything"). As a singer in a rock n roll band who may have gone through some of the same things that he did, you had no thoughts or feeling about the whole business? "What can I say? (Laughs). What can I say? I'm sorry? Bad things happen, y'know? I'm sure it wasn't as great as everyone thinks it was." What wasn't? "His suicide, I'm sure wasn't such a glamorous event." Evidence Music Gould, Bordin, Spruance Lyrics Patton The third single released from the album. The video was directed by Walter Stern, who had worked with The Prodigy, and it was filmed in a basement club in San Francisco. The song features a string quartet with their parts arranged by Trey Spruance. Bill Gould wrote the song. "I was almost ashamed. They were like, Let’s do it. Patton said, Why not? We had the confidence to do it. If it was up to me, I probably would not have done it." - Bill 2015 | Small Victories "I like that song, it's pretty different for us. It's very laid back, groovy. There are some real strings on it, the punctuating sort of strings... a sort of Soul II Soul vibe." - Roddy 1994 "We've always wanted to write a great pop song, evidence is just that. I think we needed to lose a guitarist to achieve the end result." - Patton 1997 | Kerrang! Patton and Bordin talk about the song in CMJ New Music Monthly, April 1995: Patton starts cackling--a high, weird Tex Avery laugh more animated than his surreal singing personas--and the effect is more unsettling than seeing him mad. Perhaps he is mad, and Faith No More fans are mere visitors to a sort of travelling asylum. After all, why would a rational human being leave a trail of droppings across U.S. stages for hapless clean up crews to discover? And is that what this "scat" singer is celebrating alongside Bottum's soothing-but-funkified keys on "Evidence"? "Step beside the piece of circumstance/ Got to wash away the taste of evidence," he groans, painting a visceral but nonetheless stomach-churning picture. "I, uh, don't remember, I claim ignorance," Patton weasels when quizzed about the track. "I wrote the song and that's enough--you have fun with it. I don't have to tell you shit." The point exactly. Oddly enough, he doesn't shy away from this purloined-doodle rumours. "You do what you gotta do to get you through," he explains. It sounds quite logical. "It's like , you're a musician, right? You wake up at 2:00 in the afternoon, you don't have any responsibilities, you don't have any certainties in your life, other than the fact that you're gonna play that night. So you may as well throw a couple of others in there, something to look forward to." Bordin seems to understand his teammate's curious credo. "But we don't like living in the past," he chortles. "We've gotta find some new habits to do this time around." "I'm gonna leave part of my colon behind this time," Patton declares. "Yeah!" Bordin responds. "It'll look like little pieces of sausage casing!" Then the duo breaks into happy hysterics, infatuated with its own morbid sense of humour. But Bordin--a founding father of Faith No More along with Bottum and Gould (Patton clambered about on Real Thing, the band's third release)--suddenly stops laughing, turns poker-faced serious about the tell-tale "Evidence" cut. "That's the one I'm most proud of," he says. "All the loud songs turned out really great on this album, really aggressive, and we've always done that really well. But the smoother songs I've never felt we've gotten exactly right. And this one is pretty damn close to being *exactly* right." The Gentle Art Of Making Enemies Music Gould, Bordin, Patton Lyrics Patton This brutal track defines the sentiment of the album - loaded with angst, abhorrence and self ridicule, it seems to look back critically on the past five years of the band. "Patton was also heavily involved in the music for the even more going for- the-jugular ‘The Gentle Art Of Making Enemies’. I had some riffs that I couldn’t do anything with, and Mike just took them and went home and arranged the whole song. He came back the next day, and was like, Look what I did with those riffs you had." - Bill 2015 | Small Victories Star A.D. Music Gould, Bordin, Patton Lyrics Patton, Gould The jazz-funk flavours of this song are straight out of a 50's dance hall. Gould wrote most of the song, he wrote and arranged the horn section which were played live in the studio. "It felt like Las Vegas, ripped vinyl seats, and dirty shag carpet, $1.99 buffets. It felt shabby and glam, glam and shabby at the same time." - Bordin 2015 | Small Victories "I like the chords that the horn guys did during the verses; they sound really thick. That's my favorite part. That and that little spy section... That's a nice little breath of fresh air. It opens up into a space that the album never touches upon anywhere else." - Trey 1994 Some of the lyrics were taken from the 1965 French film Alphaville directed by Jean-Luc Godard. 'When you die......You'll become something worse than dead.....You'll be become a Legend'. The lyrics appear to refer to the entrapment of fame and the consequences of being famous, the music press would again draw conclusions that the song was about Kurt Cobain. "Kurt? God no! It's about a phenomenon. And if that guy happened to be one, I don't know. It's one of those things that happen; it's a Vegas thing. What could be more shameful than having to change your colostomy bag on stage?! Vegas is great, though. I love it. Welcome to America." - Patton 1995 | Metal Hammer "The guitar solo is like Saturday Night Live, that's the vibe. It's so funny because we try to explain to people that we write songs visually. We think of scenes and that's exactly what we wanted to do. We kind of amuse ourselves and that's cool because it means we're growing as musicians" - Bill 1995 | Faces Cuckoo For Caca Music Gould, Patton, Spruance Lyrics Patton On this song we hear the heaviest sound on the record, not too dissimilar from the repetitive beats of the We Care A Lot album. It is a hideous masterpiece and on the surface the lyrics seem to describe Patton's old shit eating hobby perfectly. However, read a little further and it would appear to be a metaphor for drug abuse. In 1995 Patton addressed the meaning while talking to NME in Venice: NME: "Would you call it a shit-eating manifesto?" Patton: "I really don't remember. If I could sit here and write the words out I might be able to remember." NME: A lyric sheet is laid before him. Patton: "it's just....shit. Shit is...shitty people, garbage, everything. What do you think it's about?" Trey again added the keys which directed the song back towards the FNM brand. "Bill was a bit stumped, keyboard-wise, what to do on that, Trey came with a big, dark keyboard, that Hammond-organ melody, that descending thing that was really doomy and heavy. I was stoked that someone outside of this trio of musicians could come and contribute something like that. It was like starving, and someone coming along and throwing you food. It showed that we weren’t being unreasonable. People can do stuff like that." - Bordin 2015 | Small Victories Caralho Voador Music Gould, Patton, Bordin Lyrics Gould, Patton, Bordin This Latin flavoured easy listening song has a title which translates from Portuguese as 'Flying Dick'. The middle section also shows off Patton's growing skills at foreign language, roughly translated as: 'I can't drive... With my index finger... up my nose.' The song is the first true character study on the album, a tool which was much more employed on Angel Dust. "I think we're just getting better at imitating, because that's what it is. Us hearing a bossanova thing, that's not bossanova. You gotta make that distinction. Just picture a guy who's a really bad driver, that's kind of what it's about" - Patton 1995 | Metal Maniacs Ugly In The Morning Music Patton, Spruance, Gould Lyrics Patton Track eight on the album is particularly reminiscent of the signature FNM sound fine tuned over their first three albums. The chug of the bass, swelling keyboard chords, the clicking syncopation of the drums and melodic guitars. A great example of Patton’s ability to use words ambiguously and create such a menacing song from something as mundane as waking up and looking rough! Digging The Grave Music Gould, Bordin, Patton Lyrics Patton "Radio will say the our song 'Digging The Grave' is too hard for them, too metal. If we do a song like 'Evidence', then none of the metal stations will want it!" - Bill 1994 Full FNM Followers analysis of the song HERE. Take This Bottle Music Gould Lyrics Patton, Gould The smooth country and western tones of this song make it a standout track from anything FNM had done before, a track Jim Martin would've been comfortable with! Yet another song brought in whole to the table by Bill. "I wrote 'Take This Bottle' on a 4-track at my house; I didn't even think it would be appropriate for the band, but I played a demo for everybody and they liked it. I was kind of intimidated to volunteer it, but I'm glad I did, because I think it really adds to the record." - Bill 2015 | Bungle Weird "I really dig that one. It's a song where I sit back and play and I almost don't even play, it's almost like auto-pilot, and I listen to everybody else. It's very minimal. Kinda reminds me almost of Bob Dylan or something, kinda country, twangy, or something. I'm really excited that we're doing a song like that, and I bet it's gonna surprise a lot of people. Again, the singing is great. It's my wife's favourite song." - Patton 1995 | CMJ Monthly "It's like a Guns N' Roses song! Maybe Hank Williams lyrics, but definitely GN'R music." - Bill 1995 | CMJ Monthly King For A Day Music Gould, Bottum, Bordin, Patton , Spruance Lyrics Patton The epic drama of this song fits in well with FNM's catalogue. Trey adds an acoustic guitar which is something rarely heard on a FNM song, hence the working title of Acoustic Groove. "I like the textures of that song a lot. I think the textures are what's really gonna eventually make or break that song. The string sound was really nice, and just the breath of the acoustic guitars was really important. It sounds great, the strumming of that guitar. And the intro and the outro are my favourite parts - the simpler parts, going into the song, coming out of the song, I really like a lot. It gets really dense in the middle, which is a part of the whole journey of that song, but my favourite parts of the song are going into it and coming out of it. It's very Roxy Music to me, almost David Bowie, sorta like a surreal sort of travelling composition to me." - Roddy 1994 "I like the regal feel of it... Not so much regal - it does change its ambience, but - it sorta maintains a largeness to it, like a presence, like you're inside some sort of large chamber of some type, and without a bunch of reverb. It's not effects that are causing that, it's the mood of the music. I think it's very moody. It reminds me of a Peter Murphy solo album or something like that." - Trey 1994 "We had that in Billy's house on his computer. We worked on that song for a long time, to keep the balance between the lightness and the loud parts. It took a lot of work; that was a difficult song to work on. Really glad the way it turned out. It kinda reminds me of early Roxy Music, which I was a really big fan of. It's got that elegant, suave tone, but it's still like a rock song. The middle of that song is cool, too, because we waited 'til we were in the studio, and we wrote it in the studio, so it was kinda like a jam. Which is also really exciting, we didn't really do that very often." - Bordin 1994 What A Day Music Patton, Spruance Lyrics Patton 'Kill the body and the head will die', a phrase that appears in Hunter S. Thompson's Fear And Loathing In Las Vegas. At two minutes thirty seven seconds, yet another short song filled with Patton's disgust. The Last To Know Music Gould, Patton, Bordin Lyrics Patton The title of this song appears on a banner in the Stanley Kubrick movie Full Metal Jacket : 'First to go last to know - We will defend to the death your right to be misinformed'. This song could nod towards trudging and melancholy ditties by bands such as Stone Temple Pilots if it wasn’t for Patton’s extravagant operatic vocals and Bordin’s signature flams. Trey’s melodic yet unpretentious solos are a highlight as he layers guitar over guitar to create a wholly different sound to anything FNM have done before. Roddy and Trey discuss the song with Jai Kim in 1995: JK: Okay, the song "The Last to Know." RB (to Trey): Which one was that? TS (to Roddy): "Dirge." TS (to JK): Yeah, I have similar feelings on that one. I like the space that that song creates. Very large space. RB: Very dense. Texture's very dense. JK: Nice tempo. Not too fast. TS: Yeah, it plods. RB: Pearl Jam. [Everyone laughs.] Pearl Jam on mushrooms. JK (to Trey): I love your guitar solo on that. TS: Oh really? Jimi Hendrix, right? [More laughs.] Thanks, yeah, that was a five­in­the­morning one, for sure. Just A Man Music Gould, Bottum Lyrics Patton, Gould , Spruance Possibly the most majestic and ambitious song in FNM's entire catalogue. Bill told a Swedish tv channel that he couldn’t believe the band wrote such a song. It is pure pop indulgence except for the unexpected middle section with Patton’s ‘movie trailer monologue’. The song comes as a surprise and counters the brief and furious tracks that proceed it, a perfect album closer. "I don't think we actually had much distance on 'Just A Man', and it probably benefited the most. Queen? Oh god, a rock opera anthem! I think it's a little more obtuse than Queen, a little bit more like if you were in your 40s and gambling, sweating, a little overweight and in love, that's the way we saw it anyway." - Roddy 1994 ”We listen to a lot of Chinese classical music they use these really nice, major, big, sweeping chords. It's a nice sound, but it almost was a little bit pretentious because it was so big. "There's also some stuff that sounds really tolerable because it's deliberately tacky. Like Just A Man, that's a tacky song. There are things there that when we were first doing them it felt like we were swallowing a big pill. Like, ‘Oh my God, who would do something like this?’ But that's the fun of it, too.” - Bill 1995 | Faces "It's totally frightening. That song is like the spawn of some bizarre and perverse experiment. Some people, they don't get that. Some people do get that, and the people who do get it, really appreciate it" - Bordin 1994 The choir parts were arranged by Trey. "I think my favourite part from that was when all of our recording was finished and we went to the studio to add string parts and a choir at the end of the last song. And the gospel choir, it was really wonderful watching them work. It was also funny, as we showed up at the studio and nobody had realized that charts had to be written for the string players. So that job fell to me and I very quickly, off the top of my head just charted out what we thought the string parts should be, a really half-ass job and that ended up on the record, it was pretty funny." - Trey 2011| Pitch Perfect The B-Sides With the King For A Day... and consequent single releases there were more b-sides than ever before, an original song Absolute Zero and a host of covers. "The b-sides that we did were three cover songs that were actually recorded at my house. There's I Started A Joke by the Bee Gees, there's a song by a band called The Brothers Four called Greenfields, and Spanish Eyes by Al Martino! [ plus I Wanna F**k Myself by G.G.Allin ]. They all sound really good, I'm really into it! We were in this bar in Gwaum, god, it was so twisted! You see, Gwaum is like a rock in the middle of the ocean; they have like two million snakes per mile -- they have so many snakes that they have killed all the birds, they have no more birds in all of Gwaum. So, we're sitting in this bar and they have posters of hard-core porn videos all over the wall. It was a regular bar, and they had animal porn on the wall! And we're like, 'What the hell is this?!', and in the corner of the room they had this karaoke machine and they were all singing the words "I started a joke ..." and there was this bouncing ball so they could follow the words. The lyrics were so pathetic and depressing that we just said 'We have to do this song!' It's the most miserable song I ever heard in my life!' " - Bill 1995 | Livewire Exit Spruance Enter Menta King For A day Fool For A Lifetime was released on limited edition red double vinyl on March 13th/14th and on CD and cassette on March 28th. Not only did the band return with a new sound but their image was now unrecognisable from the five rag tags who released The Real Thing six years previously. Not a trace of 'heavy metal' remained. Short hair, goaty beards, Patton's 'homeless' look and Roddy looking effortlessly cool with his almost cross-dress style. However, with one more twist in the tale, the photo-shoots of early 1995 revealed that Trey had been replaced. "Trey simply didn't want to make the commitment to tour with us. Like Billy said, it's like getting married. Some people panic at the eleventh hour, and Trey f**king threw the ring back! He ran out of the ceremony, hahaha!" - Patton 1995 | Raw After recording had finished Spruance left Faith No More. “We did the whole thing on a handshake, and basically as time went on, I recorded with them and we didn't have any formal agreement over what the situation was going to be. And I really felt that they were taking advantage of that situation, which was really disheartening. They were going through so many different issues as a band. And then to walk into a situation where you're just essentially a roadie and getting jerked around, it really ended up being this thing where, if I'm going to commit to a year of touring with no agreement and they're reneging on all of these things that we talked about — it's like, we've got you, so you're going to tour with us for a year and then we'll talk about you becoming a part of the band.” - Trey 2011 | Perfect Pitch Faith No More publicly explained the split with Trey, commenting that he was intimidated by the heavy touring schedule. Articles also referred to Trey being a spoilt rich kid who threw an opportunity away. However, Trey remembers leaving the band differently and attributes his departure to red tape and unegotiable contracts. “...the part that was so surreal was when my friend told me, 'Trey, you've got to see this interview in NME. The guys are saying all this stuff about you.' So I get on my bike and ride down Divisadero to Tower Records, and at that point I didn't have any fucking money at all, so I was looking under books and laundry and all this shit, scraping for change. At the end of the month I always got to the point where I was scraping for burrito money. So I got $2.75 to buy a burrito after looking at [the NME interview]. I don't even have enough money to buy the fucking magazine, and I'm standing there in Tower Records reading about how I'm the heir to the Dupont fortune. [laughs] That was a surreal experience, having the bicycle, barely scraping by, and having the entire fans' perception being this completely other thing. I can't tell you how fruitful of an experience that was. Most of the philosophies that I'm interested in have to do with the engineered appearance of the world that we live in versus the esoteric or hidden reality behind it. I feel very privileged to be in a world where I can deal with some press coverage like that.” - Trey 2011 | Perfect Pitch Trey would not perform the songs he had invested in, and which would not have been so dramatic or diverse without his playing and influence, until 2011 at Maquinaria Festival in Chile. FNM were guitar-less yet again, but this wouldn’t last long - enter Dean Menta. "I initially started working with Faith No More on the crew during the Angel Dust tour. I was doing computer consultancy with regards to music software programs. What I basically did, and still do, are all sorts of sequencing and hard disk recording stuff. Roddy got my name and number from somewhere, so I started hooking up with him every so often trying to teach him more about computers and then I went on tour with him. I guess he'd never had a roadie before, he and Billy used to share the same guy, but on the Guns N' Roses tour they wanted a separate person for each job. I'd never done keyboards before, never been on the road, had no prior experience of bands at that level." - Dean 1995 | Hot Metal FNM finally thought they had found the right man for the job. His playing, performance, attitude and style fit in perfectly with the aesthetic of King For A Day. "The 'Angel Dust' tour was indispensable because we met Dean. He saw what we went through and respected that. He took two years of his life to hang out with us so we would know him, because he wanted to be in this band. He said he's been been waiting for three years for this opportunity and he sure as hell isn't gonna f**k it up. I respect that." - Bordin 1995 | Kerrang! Dean and Bill together recorded and produced the covers included on singles from King For A Day as b-sides - including I Started A Joke and their collaboration with Sparks This Town Ain’t Big Enough For The Both Of Us (not released until 1998). But when it came to writing new material Dean and the core members didn’t have a spark. “When it came to songwriting it didn't work. We found no compromises when we wrote songs, because we come from very different directions. I was pissed, because Dean is really ok as a friend...” - Bill 1997 | Zillo ”I think a decision was made to stop the KFAD tour early because ticket sales were really down or something like that. Then certain members of the band wanted to immediately start writing songs for another record. I think at that point in time we were all burnt out, at least I was. I was living in L.A. with Jennifer at that time and was trying to go back and forth to SF for rehearsals. Writing songs was not going very smoothly and eventually I think I got pushed off the boat before it totally sunk, so to speak. I was disappointed and yet relieved that it was all over. I was mostly baffled and confused by the entire experience. I did have bad feelings afterward, but they’ve faded away a long time ago. I still love and admire those guys a lot.” - Dean 2016 | Furious Ultimately in 1996 Faith No More were looking for guitarist number twelve to take them into their next era. Don‘t Let Me Die With That Silly Look In My Eyes After six and a half months of touring, an incredibly short stint for FNM, the band cancelled dates and retreated to their own separate activities. “We pushed ourselves, and dealt with where we were as musicians, as people, dealt musically with loss, change and struggle. The results are as varied and chaotic as any of our records, and in a perfect world it represents exactly where we were at the time.” - Roddy 2017 | Reissue Liner Notes KFAD was recorded under the most demanding conditions - the absence of Roddy, a new guitarist, a new producer and environment. However even under these circumstances the band managed to create their most ferocious and forthright album, also with some of their most ambitious and diverse songs. A testament to FNM’s talent and tenacity. It’s an album revered by fans provoking the debate which is the best FNM album Angel Dust or King For A Day... It is praised by critics as criminally underrated. Happy birthday. #faithnomore #kingforadayfoolforalifetime #kfad25 #billygould #mikebordin #mikepatton #roddybottum #treyspruance #deanmenta

In 2018 Roddy Bottum was in Toulon, France recording with French instrumental group Hifiklub we can now hear the first song from these sessions, David Says. "Hifklub and Roddy Bottum met by chance in New York while the Toulon variable geometry quartet were working on In Doubt, Shadow Him!, their album and film with Lee Ranaldo (Sonic Youth). A few months later, a first musical rapprochement took shape with a project celebrating the American poetess Emily Dickinson. This initial collaboration quickly pushed the two parties to extend their discussions in the dynamics of a long format. True to its most impulsive creative approach, a handful of repetitions is useful to Hifiklub for composing the rhythmic and melodic bases of nine titles to which is added a very singular cover of Eye of the Tiger (Survivor). A single day was enough to record in the basements of an old nightclub, dark and damp. At this stage, the musical intention was directly inspired by this particular working environment: a pop trance, tight formats that contrast with the latest experimental proposals from Hifiklub. A plane ticket later, and Roddy Bottum finds himself on the French Riviera, in Saint Aygulf more exactly. Taking up the marked spontaneity of the musical tracks, the pianist of Faith no More wrote with the studio arrangements and texts which direct the compositions towards a definitive darkness. Bottum's voice, deep and melancholy, gives the project an unexpected sensuality.” The collaboration's new album, Things That Were Lost In The Fire, will be released in June on Dreamy Life Records (USA) and Toolong Records (rest of the world / Differ-Ant distribution). www.hifiklub.com www.toolongrecords.com www.dreamyliferecords.com #roddybottum #hifiklub

Watch the new video for Zeus! featuring Mike Patton‘s cover of The Cramps classic Human Fly directed by Displaced / Replaced This song is the first to be released from the upcoming one hundredth Three One G release, a tribute album to The Cramps titled Really Bad Music For Really Bad People: The Cramps as Heard Through the Meat Grinder of Three One G. Three One G’s one hundredth release will be another tribute, this time to an iconic band known for its raunchy and pure punk spirit, all while looking effortlessly cool: The Cramps. For the label’s third comp, the lineup of musicians enlisted to take part is even more diverse, including the likes of Chelsea Wolfe, Daughters, Mike Patton, and Metz, among others—all members, in some way or another, of the extended Three One G family. Here you’ll hear everything from Cumbia-style Cramps as interpreted by Sonido De La Frontera, to Panicker’s electronic dance-centric distorted version of “I’m Cramped”. Just as The Cramps mastered the art of covering music through their own warped lens, Three One G carries on the torch of re-imagining songs with swagger and style, making it their own while honoring a band whose influence on the label is obvious. If you pre-order the album from Apple Music, you get the Zeus!/Mike Patton and Metz covers as instant downloads now. #mikepatton #zeus #thecramps

On April 18th Bloc Global will release First Hellos and Last Goodbyes, a collection of Chuck Mosley live performances The guys at Bloc Global and author of Reintroducing Chuck Mosley : Life On and Off The Road, Doug Esper, are doing their very best to keep Chuck’s memory alive. For Record Store Day 2019 Bloc Global released The Joe Haze Sessions which included Chuck's studio covers of Take This Bottle (Faith No More) and Nothing Compares To You (Prince). Doug toured with Chuck during 2016 and 2017 on what would sadly be his last live appearances before his untimely passing. The tour took Chuck and his band mates throughout the U.S and UK with stops in other European countries. First Hellos and Last Goodbyes is eight live recordings from this tour, remastered and available on Record Store Day April 18th on Electric Blue Vinyl - with a stunning booklet packed with photos. The release will be limited to 700 copies. Doug issued this statement about the release. "Before we had even played a show together, Chuck had his eyes set on a live album. There were many reasons involved, such as not having money for a proper studio recording or new songs to record. As we played out, I tried to record each show on my phone. A few people brought cameras or microphones to get better quality recordings. When Chuck started writing new material he planned on adding those onto the live record as well, assuming he’d never get them down in a studio (Unless he recorded them for the next VUA record). Since we came back from the UK in 2016, I’ve been chopping up various songs/banter/mistakes/sound checks/practice recordings in preparation for the live record to be completed. It has gone through a million iterations, songs have been switched in and out and in again. Shows have also come and gone. This is not your typical live record with multitrack recordings and a coached audience and post-show studio overdubs. This is Chuck, raw and (mostly) unedited. I mean, look, he and I talked way too much onstage and as a band we started and stopped songs way too much, so I took the liberty to chop enough of that out to achieve more of the sound Chuck envisioned for our sets. He wanted to start quiet, build, build, build, bring it back down, and then build into a chaotic wall of noise at the end. He wanted the set to be one continuous movement as each song melded into the next one. Anyway, Don’t overthink it. Grab a copy and enjoy the work Chuck put in and the great songs he wrote. The Reintroduce Yourself to was the first chance many of us fans got to see him perform and the last time many old friends were able to hang out. First Hellos and Last Goodbyes. I hope you dig it." A Side 1. Sophie (Live in Manchester) 2. Blue Heart (Live in Knoxville) 3. Come Around (Live in Huntsville) 4. Song #2 (Live in Huntsville) B Side 1. Nameless (Live in Manchester) 2. Tractor (Live in London) 3. Bella Donna (Live in London) 4. Bob Forest (Live in London) 5. C to G (Douglas' unapproved hidden track) #chuckmosley #dougesper #firsthellosandlastgoodbyes

Every band goes through a crisis. Someone leaves, someone f**ks up, someone dies. Something happens to make the rest of the band wonder if it's worth carrying on. Faith No More thought about splitting up in 1993. Royal Flush by Mike Peake They'd just finished a rock-till-ya-drop, not entirely pleasant world tour supporting their 'Angel Dust' LP. Four of the band were,to put bluntly, pig sick of the fifth man - Jim Martin - and keyboard player Roddy Bottum was going through his own private hell with a bunch of personal problems. So, band front man Mike Patton, bassist Bill Gould and drummer Mike 'Puffy' Bordin talked about calling it a day. Those words - 'splitting' - were actually mentioned. After all, what lay ahead for the increasingly malcontent San Franciscan five-piece? Another f**king album. More touring, touring, touring. All this and the band were - to coin a phrase falling to pieces. What would have been easier than saying, 'f**k it. We've made some money, we've had some fun, let's lay this f**ker to rest'. Anything would have been easier. So Faith No More came close, very close, to splitting up back in 1993. What happened instead has been well documented. They ganged up on Jim Martin and kicked the beardy-weirdo axe god the hell out of the band. They insist it was the best thing that they've ever done. But since that fateful December '93 day when Jim was given the boot. Faith No More have been pretty cagey about his dismissal. They've never really opened up. Not until now... Faith No More formed in San Francisco in 1980 and fooled around with several singers (including, amazingly enough, Courtney Love) before settling on Chuck Mosley in 1983. Mosley left in 1988 and, after a brief stint with Reggae punksters Bad Brains, formed his own band, Cement. Mr. Bungle Singer Mike Patton then joined Faith No More and the ensuing album, 'The Real Thing', turned the band into a household name. In December 1993, Jim Martin was sacked, and was replaced by Mr Bungle axeman Trey Spruance, who worked with the band on one album - the imminent 'King For A Day... Fool For A Lifetime'. Spruance left during Christmas 1994 and was replaced by Dean Menta - a former FNM roadie. Which brings us right up to date. Faith No More, minus Menta, are in Venice in a hotel that overlooks one of the city's main waterways. St Mark's Square is about 400 yards west, and there are plenty of tourists despite the miserable weather. Things are pretty relaxed in the FNM camp, as Patton, Bordin, Bottum and Gould spend a few days touring the city and talking to journalists about their new album. But talk of Jim Martin is unavoidable. 'King For A Lifetime...' is a rebirth. An awakening. And it wouldn't have been possible if everything had stayed as it was. Mike Patton looks comically like a kid as he sits on a low chair behind a high table in the hotel lounge. Any writer will tell you he's not much fun to interview - by his own admission he's "not very good at it" - but he offers his full attention. He orders some espresso coffees. "After the 'Angel Dust' tour we didn't know if we were gonna be a band any more," he reveals. "We didn't want to do split up, and I think now that it would have been a stupid thing to do. "But for a coupla years we didn't confront any of the things that were wrong in our band. When you leave things to fester like that, it doesn't do any good." Adds Bill Gould, who's swapped his long locks for a goatee beard since he was last under the spotlight: "If we'd have kept on with Jim we would have broken up. In the end, Jim actually got the message that he was out of the band via a fax machine! None of us even wanted to talk to him." Drummer Mike Bordin: "This time in the studio, it was 100 per cent better. And it wasn't just because Jim wasn't there. It was Billy, Mike and Roddy and me. Let's get to work!" For God's sake -what was so bad about Jim?! "Well, that's a tough one," shrugs Bordin. "Why do people get divorced? Is it one thing? You just know. "We all felt that we could be better. We could feel it in our hearts. Yeah, maybe we were driving along at 90mph, but we knew there were a couple more gears up there somewhere so we could really f**kin' push it up. And I feel that we have. "Jim's a character, he's endearing, but I'm just over it. We were lucky to get 'Angel Dust' to turnout as well as it did. It was f**kin' difficult. It was f**kin' painful! There were two camps working at cross purposes, and that ain't good." It's been said that you had it in for Jim for years. "Whatever anyone says, we actually wanted to hear what Jim could contribute to these new songs and we really suspended judgement until then. We told him to bring some songs in and gave him some of ours to deal with." Did he do it? "Yeah, but it just didn't feel right. It felt like more of the same. Now, instead of one f**king difficult, strange, schizo-type record, maybe two really good records will come out of this. I really think that we made a record that's great, and when Jim gets full steam ahead he will make the picture out of his own vision." "Jim was a very vocal, very visual person," reckons Gould. "He was an image - but that's where it stopped, so when Jim left nothing really changed. Jim wasn't involved with the music nearly as much as people think. "He's the kind of person who takes well to the media. If I was his manager, I know I could sell him like a cartoon character. The rest of us are less likely to market our personalities and are more inclined to sell the music." Is there anything at all that you missed about Jim in the studio? Bordin:"No, nothing at all." Gould: "Nothing, man. It's over, We'd tried for years to sort things out and we were f**kin' exhausted." Patton: "Maybe his cigar smoke." Trends come fads go. FNM have been missing-in-action for what seems like forever. "I didn't mind that," says Bordin. "I was just desperate to get the album done right." "It's hard to take a break," Gould counters. "The big thing was wondering if we were gonna put a record out at all. "A lot of people were advising us that Jim has a very public image and that we shouldn't jeopardise everything by making changes. 'Find a way to work with him, don't do anything stupid...' So we had to deal with all this shit. Then Roddy's Dad dies and some of his friends died too. He was a good friend of Kurt Cobain, so that shook him up." But you were at least able to take stock of what you've achieved in the past five years. Your initial success came from out of nowhere. "We were falling to pieces!" Bordin laughs. "We were too busy to even notice when 'The Real Thing' broke. It was exciting, but we were busy being on tour when things really started hitting. I'm glad we didn't get to see MTV! "Having success thrust upon you is weird. You say, 'Hang on, I'm only doing what I do'. People then think you're ungrateful. "Look at Eddie Vedder What's wrong with that guy? He's the voice of a generation and he doesn't wanna do it! He doesn't wanna lead me out of the wilderness or make my life better or get me laid more often or fix my car!" Patton: "I don't remember if I enjoyed that time. To me, that period probably won't make sense for a while. It was almost like a big joke. There really wasn't any pressure, it was just like. 'Huh?' A lot of question marks. You don't learn until you start giving to people who want a piece of you, and then, suddenly, there's nothing left." What about all the, er... girls? "Yeah. Once again, you learn the hard way. You make a million f**king mistakes. But you learn. If you don't, you're a casualty. One more casualty. "People always expect you to complain about your success. To feel guilty for it. That's probably the worst thing about it. "If it was that bad, why didn't we all kill ourselves? This poo-pooing of success is very over-rated. We could have come back and made a noise album, and then we'd have been all happy, right?" Gould: "Back then we were perceived as a gimmick: a mixture of Metal and Funk and we had this pretty-boy singer We found it really repulsive. We started getting tapes from bands who were Heavy Metal Funk bands and they were saying we were their main influence! It was horrible! " 'Angel Dust' was a way for us to stretch our arms out and hold on to our identity. When Patton cut his hair and changed how he looked, it was seen as very negative. What he was actually doing was a positive thing keeping his own identity in control and not becoming like a piece of McDonalds hamburger People thought we had a bad attitude." But it must have been good when the money started rolling in? Patton: "I was very young back then, so it was strange. It didn't really seem real. I didn't do the usual Rock star thing and blow it left, right and centre - I put it in a f**kin' bank! Put it in a f**kin' bank and still lived with my parents to save rent! I did buy a car" A flashy one? "No, just a normal car." Very sensible. "Not so sensible -I wrecked it!" "The money didn't start till the 'Real Thing' tour was over," adds Gould. "It takes a year or so. We had a Platinum record, we were touring everywhere for two years and everyone was acting as if we were all millionaires. All this when you haven't even got your first pay cheque yet! It was very frustrating." How much was your first big cheque? "It was for $20,000 each - and that was an amazing day. But it's not all that much considering what we'd achieved. "If I knew then what I know now, I think I'd think twice about going into the music business. It's a very hard way to make a living, even at our level. For what we make and what we do, we're middle class Americans, really. "I'm sure all your readers think we're multi-millionaires. It's hard. It really isn't you think." Five years after 'The Real Thing', Faith No Mo re are happier than ever. And they are almost embarrassingly enthusiastic about their new LP, which merges hook-happy, super-heavy FNM classics-to-be with a bunch of adventurous off the wall compositions.. Patton: "I can tell right now that we're gonna have a good time touring these songs live. In the past that wasn't always the case." "The new record is like being hit with a f**kin fist, with one finger sticking out!" beams Bordin. "I think this is a really f**kin' special record. I'm honestly, sincerely, really proud of it. "This is the best record we've ever done. But it doesn't just come outta your button a plate. The songs, the performance, the recording process, the tones, the mix, the mastering. It's a whole bunch of shit that makes a good album." Gould: "It's heavier, it's more direct and it's the first record where we had the guitar the way we wanted it. We always knew the potential we had, but everything was always a fight. Now it feels like we're a dog who's been let off the leash." Considering all that's been said about Jim, Trey Spruance must have seemed like an angel? Patton: "He was great. And it was a convenient thing to do. I know how he works, he knows how I work. Once we'd settled in with Trey, the writing process went really quick." But he didn't last long... "Yeah, but I wanted to give it every possibility for the situation to grow. I wasn't surprised when Trey made up his mind to leave, because it would have happened sooner or later-and if it had happened later it would have been ugly. Now we're separated it's definitely for the better, and it's not affected my relationship with him on a personal level either. I gotta record with him again soon for the new Mr Bungle record." Is there any concern that because of all the turmoil surrounding 'King For A Day...' - which features an axe man who won't be seen on tour - that it won't be perceived as a bona fide FNM LP? Patton: "Maybe but I don't think the majority of people will give a shit. I mean, the guitar's gonna sound good and it'll stop there. I mean, I've had people mistake me for Chuck Mosley! So that's the end of that!" Bordin: "The fact that he won't play these songs live doesn't matter, I because these are our songs." Gould: "I look forward to the day where we can write an album with a guitarist who can contribute as much as ; we can. A guitar player we don't have to fight with." ' What would new kid Dean Menta have to do to be out of the band? Patton: "Stop being Dean! Right now, I we've rehearsed for a month and recorded a few B-sides and that's it. It's very hard to guess how it will develop. But in terms of the band I feel more i comfortable than I have for a while. "Now I don't have to worry about turning my head this way so I don't see that guy, or feel forced to ignore something because I don't wanna fight anybody." Bordin: "The 'Angel Dust' tour was indispensable because we met Dean. He saw what we went through and respected that. He took two years of his life to hang out with us so we would know him, because he wanted to be in this band. "He said he's been been waiting for three years for this opportunity and he sure as hell isn't gonna f**k it up. I respect that." #faithnomore #kingforadayfoolforalifetime #fnmhistory

It’s no secret that Mike Patton likes to stay active, but with countless projects on the go could this year be the most Patton-tastic ever? In late 2019 Patton’s manager and partner in crime at Ipecac, Greg Werckman, told us the man of a thousand voices "had never been busier". So far this statement is proving to be accurate. Just yesterday Michael Crain, guitarist for Dead Cross, shared two pictures on social media of himself and Patton with the caption “Like two kids in a candy store listening to the new Dead Cross rough mixes.” From recent posts by Scott Ian, and Mr. Bungle, all evidence suggests that the present line-up are indeed re-recording their 1985 demo Raging Wrath Of The Easter Bunny with Ian and Dave Lombardo at Dave Grohl‘s 606 Studio in L.A . With half of DxCx hanging out it shouldn’t be too hard to assume that DxCx have been running through some stuff too. The band have made no secret that they are currently working on a follow up record to their 2017 debut - that makes two Patton records that could be released sometime this year. On April 3rd Patton and Australian composer Anthony Pateras will release their second tētēma collaboration, Necroscope - the total is now three. Both Duane Denison and Trevor Dunn have indicated that a fifth Tomahawk album and follow up to 2013's Oddfellows is recorded and awaiting vocals - four! Oh Jesus! And let's not forget in an interview for french publication Noise Patton alluded to a second collaboration with Jean Claude Vannier - Could we be blessed with FIVE releases within the next 12 months? It's seems unlikely that all these projects will be completed or released in the near future however it certainly looks like Mike’s future is mapped out. Faith No More are of course touring from May to September - no South American dates announced yet so this could be longer. Therefore we shouldn't expect Patton will have the time to promote these albums in 2020. Looks like 2021 may also be a busy year for Patton! There is more to add to this schedule also, Justin Pearson’s Three One G Records will release Really Bad Music For Really Bad People: The Cramps As Heard Through The Meat Grinder Of Three One G. This tribute to The Cramps features a cover of Human Fly by Italian duo Zeus! and Patton. And, we will soon see Patton on film talking baseball in the upcoming documentary Baseball Furies. In the past Patton has had some busy years, between 2001 and 2005 he was crazy with music from Fantômas, Tomahawk, Peeping Tom and Zorn, plus touring and guest appearances... however over this next 12 months he could surpass that personal best. In short it‘s a fucking great time to be a fan of Mike Patton! #mikepatton #deadcross #mrbungle #tetema #tomahawk

Faith No More officially began their tour of King For A Day Fool For A Lifetime in the UK twenty five years ago RAW Magazine | Issue 171 | March 1995 Childish by Neil Jeffries WEIRD. REALLY. Weirder than usual, even. A lighting stand that falls over. A keyboard gremlin. A guitar gremlin. But weirdest of all, a singer seemingly hell bent on self-destruction. And no, I'm not talking about his periodic bouts of shadow-wrestling when he throws himself to the stage ... I refer instead to his point-blank and increasingly irritating refusal to sing properly. Based on the evidence of Faith No More's sublime new album, King For A Day... Fool For A Lifetime, I'd expected the band to have reached a new level of on-stage maturity. The music has grown up, so why not the band? In truth, the band has, but the singer remains as childish as ever. Which is a bloody shame because Faith No More are good enough to stand out without someone impersonating the sound of a small monkey being used as a football for 90 percent of the set. It perfectly suits opener Cuckoo For Caca - you can't imagine someone like Placido Domingo singing the chorus 'Shit... Lives -. Forever!' anywhere near as convincingly as Patton - but it soon becomes an unnecessary distraction.  Time and again Mike Bordin, therefore becomes the focal point. The rock on which FNM is built, an absolutely peerless drummer, his kit should really have been set up in front of Patton's mic to teach the singer a lesson. Six years of barking like a dog, and screaming like a banshee hasn't actually ruined his voice. ( Take This Bottle - wherein he turned lounge lizard and ordered a Campari and soda - was magnificent.) But too often he yelled where once he would have sung. Hey, call me old fashioned, but I like to hear the words... New guy Dean Menta, all in black, is very intense about his Les Paul, rocking backwards and forwards from left heel to right toe, concentrating hard on the machine heads. He doesn't do a lot - but then again, if you cast your mind back, neither did Jim Martin  unless you count dribbling beer. Menta breathes new life into the Angel Dust songs and makes them sound a lot less fraught than they did three years ago. He may be virtually inaudible for most of Easy (slotted in after We Care A Lot) but whacks out That Solo note-for-note and on it - and The Real Thing material - Jim Martin's guitar is not missed at all.  Nobody, of course, missed Trey Spruance either, and it's a great shame that its his, not Menta's guitar you'll hear on the soon-to-be released album. They play exactly half of it but interrupted with just enough more familiar material to prevent any audience impatience. Mr Lighting Man's patience is tried in the middle of newie The Last To Know. The lighting stand beside Menta does a dead faint, its lights still blazing as it draws a slow lazy arc forward and just fails to brain anyone in the audience because hands reach up to catch it. Patton has a theory: "Oh shit! This is trouble!" The number grinds to a halt and Bill asks if anyone is hurt. Apparently not. Roddy therefore claims it was part of the show. Bill warms to the theme: "Yeah! Did you see the little bomb go off?" Mike: "Just like Metallica!" If nothing else, the accident puts Menta in the spotlight. He, too, gets blamed for knocking it over, but gets a name check and a cheer. Ice, but no bones, broken. The set is short - just 55 minutes - but they return to play The Crab Song, newie Evidence and Epic, and again, unexpectedly, specifically another shot at the truncated The Last To Know. A fine end but overall, a weirdly unsatisfying night and very unlikely to win them many new fans. Kerrang! | 536 | March 1995 Digging A Grave ?! by Mark Blake Fans narrowly escape injury as Faith No More kick off UK club tour! More petulant Patton antics as the Bay Area bruisers blast out eclectic new material! PLENTY OF chirpy asides to the audience can't deflect the wave of polite disinterest that greets opening act Shihad. Still unknown in the UK, the New Zealanders' scattergun delivery of numbing riffs fail to win over tonight's crowd. Undeterred, they grin and crack jokes, while singer Jon Toogood demonstrates an impressive 360-degree headbang. Shame, then, that Shihad's winning cocktail of Killing Joke and Sepultura is not to everyone's taste. One punter jokingly enquires whether Mike Patton will be eating his shit onstage tonight, such is the notoriety of Faith No More's singer's supposed dietary habits. Ironically, the headliners make their battering ram entrance with Cuckoo For Caca, from the new King For A Day... Fool For A Lifetime album. The song is a moshpit pleaser, but in all honesty it's also... er, shite. In contrast to such a throwaway opener, Be Aggressive jars the senses brilliantly, a trick repeated by Midlife Crisis and The Real Thing. Then things take another nosedive. On numerous occasions, Patton stops singing and utters a sound akin to a water buffalo receiving a nuclear warhead suppository. The crowd winces and looks bored. Pacing the stage in circles, the singer only acknowledges his surroundings when a lighting tower topples into the audience, thankfully without any disastrous consequences. The tetchiness and prickly persona is part of Patton's undoubted appeal, but his dismissive onstage performance is really wearing thin. Nobody here wants or expects cheesy platitudes and a text-book vocal delivery, but at times the singer's attitude stinks of disinterest and sheer arrogance. As the rest of Faith No More slide irrevocably towards middle age, perhaps Patton feels the need to offset his partners' increasing years and musical bravura by remaining the caterwauling surf brat, bellowing over the old hits and snubbing his audience just to keep them on their toes. It's just a theory, but with new guitarist Dean Menta in the place of the undeniably very Metal Jim Martin, FNM now look strangely respectable, and there's a force of delivery in this band's overall sound that just wasn't there on the last tour. The set itself is shrewdly loaded with familiar items to off-set against the new material. But Digging The Grave and Evidence, in particular, are ideal bedfellows for From Out Of Nowhere, Easy, We Care A Lot and an encore of the Chuck Mosley era track The Crab Song Predictably, the spooky fairground keyboard and juddering rhythm of Epic reminds you that, however much Patton fluffs his lines, it's still one of the most exhilarating Rock songs of the last 10 years. Brilliant, but often brilliantly bad, Faith No More are as frustrating as ever. Metal Hammer | April 1995 Ferocious Neurosis by Andy Stout AND so the bubbling, bickering mass of neuroses that is Faith No More descends on Portsmouth, a city already quite neurotic enough, thank you very much. FNM are loud, uncompromising, eventful and ultimately hollow. A while into their set, part of the lighting rig slams down into the audience. Luckily no-one was hurt.. . But before all that happens you got Shihad. Shihad probably are the future - a mass of jagged, angular rhythms bathed in luridly executed guitar. Despite a huge catalogue of influences, there's a sparseness to Shihad. Everything's been boiled down and reduced to its most basic components and then reassembled into a weighty, throbbing beastie with fire in its belly. They're exuberant, loud, and probably intelligent enough to get a crossover with the indie crowd. If there is justice in the world (and they leave off the Bowie covers), Shihad will be huge. Faith No More are huge, but are they still the future? Not really. Yes, they have one of the tightest rhythm sections in the business, and yes, Mike Patton is still a great front man, but in a lot of ways they seem to have lost direction. Their set is aggression incarnate. Be Aggressive and Midlife Crisis are spat out with savage ferocity, Epic is the classic it always has been, but underneath the bombast it's all gone stale. No longer at the cutting edge, FNM are becoming one-dimensional. Their hostility is still intact, but the sense of witnessing Something new and exciting has all but disappeared. Bands like this have to he constantly evolving and FNM simply aren't. From neuroses to Alzheimer's can be a frighteningly short journey. #faithnomore #kingforadayfoolforalifetime