PURPLE ONION

To date, this is the only studio album released by The Frog Brigade, one of Les Claypool's side projects (who coincidentally just reformed for a tour at the time of this writing). This has the same quirkiness one expects of Primus but without getting quite as heavy. Claypool sets this up almost as a sort of demented "Sgt. Pepper's", with most tracks sandwiched between the two "David Makalster" songs, which are about a newscaster bringing his audience up to date (with the second one being much more sinister).

The tracks here definitely take on a more experimental composition than one would find with Primus, but aren't so far are there to be unenjoyable. "Buzzards of Green Hill" takes on a somewhat country twang as Claypool sings of the city slickers blasting through the roads of the California country side. "Long in the Tooth," though the second shortest song on the album, features Skerik prominently on the saxophone with interesting solo parts. "Barrington Hall" features a haunting melody with cello and viola as the primary instruments (as Claypool informs us of the strange people of Barrington). "D's Dinner" is more spacey and atmospheric despite being about a real-life diner. Perhaps the wildest song is "Whamola," an instrumental piece named for which Claypool invented his own instrument called the Whamola, a single string bass played by striking it with a drumstick. The result is a heavy bass song capable of taking the lead for much of the song with some wild sounds.

I give this album 4 stars out of 5. Its an enjoyable album with a lot of interesting experiments, but there's a couple songs that miss the mark (Cosmic Highway, for one) that prevent it from being 5 star. Still a worthwhile pickup though and an underrated part of the Claypool discography.