Tomahawk — s/t

After the very succesful Fantômas album, 'The Director's Cut', Mike Patton returns with his new project Tomahawk. The guy is always busy writing new music, forming projects and helping out friends like John Zorn or Dan the Automator. I always wonder where he finds the time to do all these things. And even more curious is why most of the stuff he does is so damn good.

Tomahawk consists besides Patton of Duane Denison (Jesus Lizard), Kevin Rutmanis and John Stanier (ex-Helmet) and was founded by Denison and Patton in early 2000. The music is a mix of experimental pop and rock. Don't expect to hear something like Fantômas or Mr Bungle. This is totally different stuff.

The album starts with the song 'Flashback', which was already available for several weeks on the Ipecac Records website. The first time I heard it I was a bit disapointed. It didn't surprise me at all and it just seemed to be a 'normal' rock song. When I got the album 'Flashback' started to grow on me, it became a bit better, but it still isn't up to par with the rest of the tracks. '101 North' for instance is much better. It even has Patton doing the vocal/throat sounds like he does with Fantômas (just not as crazy and weird). The song is really good and has a nice atmosphere. Another favourite of mine is 'POP1'. A slow atmospheric track with Patton singing a catchy (poppy) refrain. The middle part even reminds me of good old Faith No More.'Sweet Smell Of Success' is another great rock-song, a bit short, but enough to keep me satisfied. Most songs are on the short side, but you'll get 13 of them, with a play time of a little bit more than 40 minutes.

All in all I think this album is pretty good. Tomahawk wrote a couple of decent tracks. Patton's vocals are as always overwhelming, but the other guys in the band do a great job as well. The album might not be, as good as Fantômas or Mr Bungle, but I'm sure most of their fans will enjoy this too. It's hard to compare the music after all and in the end this is just a really good rock album. I guess I should end this review with "Patton did it again"... how stupid it may sound, it's true.