MELVINS — Three Men And A Baby (with Mike Kunka) (review)

MELVINS — Three Men And A Baby (with Mike Kunka) album cover

Album · 2016 · Metal Related

3/5 · 2016-07-22
UMUR

"Three Men and a Baby" is the 23rd full-length studio album by US hard/heavy rock act Melvins. The album was released through Sup Pop in April 2016. The main portion of the album was recorded in 1999 with Mike Kunka from godheadSilo performing bass and vocals. The album is therefore released under the Mike & The Melvins monicker and should be considered a collaborative effort rather than a "regular" Melvins album (it is officially a part of Melvins discography though). The album initially ended up shelved but was finished in February 2015 with the aid of Toshi Kasai (working as engineer and mixer).

Collaborative effort or not, "Three Men and a Baby" sounds unmistakbaly like The Melvins. The Melvins have had several changes on the bassist post through the years, so it´s really nothing new when dealing with them. So the special thing about "Three Men and a Baby" is more the fact that all material (except the Public Image Ltd cover "Annalisa") is written by Mike Kunka and Melvins (Dale Crover and King Buzzo). But again this still sounds unmistakably like Melvins, and to be honest I don´t really hear much difference from their other output. Melvins music has a timeless quality to it, so it´s not obvious that "Three Men and a Baby" was actually recorded many years prior to it´s release.

The trademarks of Melvins sound are all there and accounted for. Hard rocking heavy riffs, idiosyncratic lyrics and vocal performances, organic bass and drumming, and an occasional touch of avant garde. The lyrics to tracks like "Bummer Conversation" and "A Friend in Need Is a Friend You Don't Need" are just as silly as they sound, but Melvins manage to make up for it by playing some really heavy and relatively catchy beats and riffs. I say relatively catchy here, because I´ve heard them deliver better and more memorable material before, and "Three Men and a Baby" is not an album featuring consistently great quality material. Nothing is downright terrible or anything like that, but only few tracks stand out as particularly memorable. Among them the avant garde grindcore track "Art School Fight Song" (which sound a bit like a leftover Fantômas track), but that´s not necessarily positive.

The album is enjoyable while it plays though, and when the band occasionally strike a magic moment where the ultra heavy riffs are in perfect unison with the raw organic rhythm section, it´s hard not to be impressed by how well playing Melvins are and envy their ability to continuously being able to come up with new crushingly heavy riff ideas. What they sometimes lack, and often do on this album, is to transform those ideas into memorable songs, but they´ve always been 100% uncompromising, so it´s a matter of take it or leave it. So I´m a bit biased when it comes to rating "Three Men and a Baby". It´s well produced, it´s incredibly well played, but the material is inconsistent in quality, and therefore a 3 star (60%) rating is warranted.