The Era Vulgaris of the Stone Age Queens

Nervously I plug in my SD-card holder in the back of the computer. I`m sitting in my usual internet-cafe in Jaipur, India, and just downloaded the new album of the Queens of the Stone Age. First I need to unzip it though, but there is no Winzip on this computer, so I also need to download that program. A few minutes later and I am ready to put the unzipped files on my SD-card, but then the damn computer doesn`t detect it. After playing around with the cable I`m finally able get the thing working. There they go, one by one; "turnin’ on the screw.mp3, sick,sick,sick.mp3, i`m designer.mp3, into the hollow.mp3, misfit love.mp3, battery acid.mp3, make it wit chu.mp3, 3’s & 7’s.mp3, suture up your future.mp3, river in the road.mp3, run, pig, run.mp3"***.

I plug the SD-card into my cheap mp3-player and start to listen while dodging traffic and cows on the way back home in Barkat Nagar. Turnin’ on the screw starts nicely, it seems the Queens got their groove back after the heavy and schizophrenic "Lullabies…". It’s catchy as hell, but sounds a lot more difficult and raw than the first six song on that previous album. Probably due to the off-beat guitar shredding throughout the song, and the electronics. I like the part where the sound goes from one ear to the other. Better production than lullabies to, that album really had a "flat" sound to it.

I already heard and saw "Sick, sick, sick" on youtube, which was presented as the first single of this album. It starts where "Feel Good Song of the summer" ended in my opinion. No complicated bullshit in the lyrics here, just a plain message with a great riff at high speed. As a hard rock fan, I don`t desire anything else. "I`m Designer" is a new Queens song. Again the characteristic Queens groove, but this time with eligible lyrics and a real socially conscious message. Coming from a band with lines such as "I seen some things I thought I never saw. Covered in hair", it is refreshing. The song has an interesting construction. As a starting musician I always wonder how you can fit the chorus, verse and bridge/break together, keeping each section original/interesting while keeping the song an coherent one. "I`m Designer" is a great example of how it should be done.

"Into the hollow" is a slower song, in the line of "I never came". It sounds very cold and naked, which fits the lyrics perfectly. At first I wasn`t really impressed by it, but after the first two minutes the song really gets a soul. The song is also heavily lead by the drums. You can clearly hear that the Queens are now three people with Josh, Joey and Troy at the helm. "Misfit Love" is probably my favorite song on this album. It has that groove of the rhythm-guitar and bass, that punch of the drums and that staccato lead-guitar, which joined together make it just perfect. And just as you thought it couldn`t get any better, the song has a kind of "you can`t quit me baby" outro at four and a half minutes. Pure bliss.

I`ve got to admit, it took me a long time before I was able to completely listen to "Battery Acid". Usually life in India was already pretty chaotic, and I didn`t need this song to create some extra pressure on my brain. After I while I got used to the album’s "metallic" vibe , and was also able to listen to this song entirely. It kind of hunts you down throughout its duration. No time to breath, just a continuous (kind of ugly) pounding. Not my favorite song on this album.

I already heard "Make it Wit Chu" on the 2003 Desert Session’s album, and then I already knew that this should be released as a single at one point in time. Such a brilliant tune, it would surely have become a hit in my universe. Homme re-recorded it for this album, probably because the original version had a production quality to it that would not have fitted on this album at all. I prefer the original though, since it has a more organic feeling to it, PJ Harvey on background vocals, and a superior guitar solo at the end. It is hard to change something that is already perfect, which makes it a kind of shame to change it at all. Still a great song though, and a resting-point on this album.

Now where do people hear Nirvana’s "Smell’s like teen spirit" on "3’s and 7’s"? I honestly do not have a clue. Ok, the chords might be slightly similar (pay attention, and you will notice that this happens all the time in music), but the progression and the rhythm are completely different. On it’s own it is a nice and catchy song, an obvious single, on the same level as "Little Sister", but nowhere near the behemoth called "No one knows".

After this run of three close to average songs, Homme gets back on track with "Suture up your future", my second favorite track on this album. It kind of shares the same style as "Into the Hollow", only worked out a lot better. It’s a very compact and solid song. Everything seems to fit together perfectly and is lead by the drums. It also has a "trippy" feeling to it. Like sitting in the back of a cab, with the driver roughly dodging traffic, while you are sitting in the back, completely smashed after a long night out.

"River in the road" reminds me of a marsh of the damned, largely thanks to the drum-pattern. In some reviews it is called filler material, with which I have to agree. It does not really grab you like to other songs, it is a bit forgettable even. The last track completely makes up for it though. "Run, Pig, Run" grabs you by the throat and tosses you around until you can`t..be…tossed…anymore. Or something similar like that. This song again has a similar feel as Battery Acid, but is more structured, has less noise and is easier to listen to. And that little break in the song is brilliant and hilarious at the same time. I thought of George Orwell’s "Animal Farm" while listening to this for the first time. Maybe because the subject matter is the same. The bonus track, "The fun Machine Took a Sh**! & Died", is perfectly described by its title. It has that typical Queens weirdness to it, which makes it a fitting end to this album.

All in all Era Vulgaris reaches my high expectation, but then again, it doesn`t. The vibe of the album is completely different from "Lullabies.." or anything else that preceded it. When I listened it completely for the first time, I didn`t really know what to think of it. Where these the "Queens of the Stone Age" that I learned to love on their previous four albums? Initially the answer was no, and I was even a bit angry and disappointed. But after a few listens I got used to this completely new direction of the band, and started to love it. I started to realise that each of the first three albums had a completely unique sound: Stoner, slick/sophisticated and just plain hard. The first half of "Lullabies.." however was almost an extension of the softer songs on "Songs for the Deaf", with the second half being more experimental. With "Era Vulgaris" Homme continued with the old trend to completely reinvent or develop his sound for each album, something which I cheer at. This development is something that in my opinion distinguishes the Queens from the Muses, Editors and Arctic Monkeys of our time: They dare to change their sound and direction significantly. At the risk that you as a critic or fan might not like it. I am a lucky one. I like it. A lot.


***Back in the Netherlands I immediately bought the new cd.