EVERY GENRE PROJECT — April 22 — Funk Metal
Genre of the Day — Funk Metal
Album of the Day — Sailing the Seas of Cheese by Primus (1991)
April 22, 2024
Extreme exhaustion is taking over my body. After this article I will shut up about Coachella, but I’m currently off of maybe four and a half hours of sleep thanks to the sun’s rude awakening at 8 AM and am typing this to the best of my ability with my eyes closed by the weight of my insistent lids. So today’s blog post may be a disservice to funk metal. Or maybe funk metal is a disservice to me. This was not my last thought when I read the written reviews of today’s top album (although I chose a different one, despite it being from the exact band) that were essentially all damning it with faint praise. Just kidding — I actually enjoyed today’s genre.
Funk metal is about as straightforward a name as we’re going to get here. It’s part funk, and it’s part metal. It’s more metal artists who embrace the funkiness in the basslines and grooves rather than the opposite way, though. The unlikely fusion genre materialized in the late ’80s. While it sounded unfamiliar to me at first glance, I quickly realized by reading the list of names associated with it — Living Colour and the RHCP being the two biggest — that it’s much more prominent than anticipated.
Both metal and funk make extensive use of their time for guitar solos, so it only makes sense that the two could seamlessly intersect. Thus, today is one of the first true bass appreciations we’ve gotten on this page. Bass is perhaps the most subtle part of a rock song, at least to my perception, but certainly one of the most essential. A good bass player plays on these subtleties, tinkering with melodies that are able to shine when you tune in just a little harder without going against the grain of the whole song. Funk metal makes room for a little more experimentation and playfulness in the bass realm, though, perhaps making it an uninhibited bassist’s paradise. This is also thanks to the greater attacking sound induced by the technique of slapping the bass, which uses the knuckle to hit on the string more forcefully and drawing out that distinctively funky sound.
It’s also just a particularly visually colorful, oddball genre. That’s if we’re taking today’s band, Primus, as the vanguard. This album cover literally features a ship sailing over Velveeta-hued waters. The lyrical content is no less eccentric, although the occasional socially analytical lyric me. The leader singer is actively singing like a pirate: the commitment to the bit is admirable. “Sergeant Baker” takes on American militarism with the context of the invasive Gulf War serving as a social background; the clichély titled “American Life” is a surprisingly effective, simple cross-section of the failure of the American promise on both immigrants and those born in the States. At other times, Primus serves up odes to fishing and the slightly frightening come-on “Tommy the Cat”. Throughout it all, what keeps the music afloat on these waves of hot cheddar is the innovative, roiling bass melodies. This was a genuinely fun listen to bring me back to the genre realm, though; here’s to the next phase of this blog!
