Everything but the kitchen sink: it’s a recipe for an album that can be hit or miss, but when on-target, it makes for a fascinating hodgepodge of music that takes repeated listens to digest. Such is Profanation (Preparation For A Coming Darkness)<\/i>, the final album by one of bass player Bill Laswell’s long-term groups, Praxis. From its first recorded album in 1992 (Transmutation<\/i>) onward, the core of the band was Laswell in the driver\u2019s seat with Buckethead on guitar and Bryan “Brain” Mantia, best known for his time in Primus, on drums. A broad range of contributors passed through the band until it was put on permanent hiatus in 2008. Among those guesting on Profanation<\/i> are keyboardist Bernie Worrell and a series of vocalists ranging from Iggy Pop to Wu-Tang Clan alumnus Killah Priest. <\/p>\n
The album opens with \u201cCaution,\u201d a hammering industrial intro number featuring a shredding Buckethead, scratching turntables, and some cookie monster vocals from Rammellzee (1960-2010), a hip hop musician whose first collaboration with Laswell dates to the late 1980s. As the listener gives their head a shake trying to compute what they just heard, a thickly accented Jamaican singer known as Hawkman chimes in with a groove atop a touch of funk from Laswell\u2019s bass in \u201cWorship.\u201d Vocals are traded with Maximum Bob, the singer of Buckethead\u2019s first band (The Deli Creeps) from the early 1990s. It\u2019s a bizarre pairing of guests but works excellently, and it is easily the catchiest song on the album.\u00a0\u00a0 <\/p>\n
The one-two punch in styles between “Caution” and “Worship” offers a taste of what’s to come. Each of the first seven tracks features a different vocalist, and each of them bring a different style to the album. Immediately identifiable is Iggy Pop on “Furies,” a slower number with his tongue-in-cheek intro of \u201cJesus is a playboy, and the world\u2019s on fire\u2026\u201d peppered by a clever range of effects. Serj Tankian, in one of his many guest appearances since System Of A Down stopped recording, sings on \u201cSulfur And Cheese.\u201d Another strong number, Tankian gets to show off both sides of his voice from the tender intro and outro, to a belting chorus of bizarre lyrics not unlike those in the goofier works on SOAD. \u201cGalaxies\u201d featuring Killah Priest and \u201cRevelations Part 2,\u201d the second track to feature Rammellzee, are spoken-word numbers that capture Laswell and Buckethead\u2019s abilities to blend with different styles \u2013 especially \u201cRevelations Part 2.\u201d From Rammellzee\u2019s delivery of lyrics, to Buckethead’s embrace of the wah pedal, to the funked up groove of Laswell, Brain, and Bernie Worrell with some turntables to boot…? It\u2019s a mix of styles that turns out great.<\/p>\n
Admittedly, not all guest tracks are winners. I never came to appreciate Mike Patton\u2019s work with Mr. Bungle or Fant\u00f4mas, and his contribution on \u201cLarynx\u201d doesn\u2019t do much to change that. Drum \u2018n\u2019 bass artist Dr. Israel\u2019s \u201cAncient World\u201d zig-zags in one ear and out the other. And Rammellzee’s third number, \u201cGarbage God’s,\u201d doesn\u2019t have the punch or groove of his first two. But for an album that tries to incorporate a variety of singers, the results are quite positive.<\/p>\n
Profanation <\/i>closes with two instrumentals, \u201cBabylon Blackout\u201d and \u201cEndtime.\u201d Reminiscent of material on Buckethead\u2019s soothing atmospheric records such as Electric Sea<\/i> and Population Override<\/i>, it\u2019s a great way to wind down from a smorgasbord of styles spread over 48 minutes. <\/p>\n
While the album takes multiple listens and a bit of patience to appreciate, it gives a great sample of what Laswell, Buckethead, and Brain could produce together as Praxis over the group\u2019s 15-year lifespan. Released in the United States in 2011, three years after its debut in Japan, the version of Profanation<\/i> available on iTunes features a pair of live tracks added as a bonus \u2013 which, if to the listener\u2019s liking, makes the band’s performance at the Bonnaroo Music Festival in Tennessee 2004<\/i> a worthy follow-up.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":61,"featured_media":34133,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[10555],"rating":[5617],"class_list":["post-45964","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-praxis","rating-rating-b-plus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/45964","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/61"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=45964"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/45964\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/34133"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=45964"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=45964"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=45964"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=45964"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}