Behind The Production of The Legendary 'Angel Dust'
Faith No More's critically acclaimed 'Angel Dust' is their fourth studio album, and their most successful album, reaching gold certification n the USA and highly ranked as 'Album Of The Year' across Europe and USA (Chadboward, 2015). Yet behind the production, was the most bizarre techniques and methods of recording the album, that was later reflected in the songs within the album. The music was described as "A wilful splatter of noise and melody, aspiration and cynicism, beauty and brutality, a million miles away from their early work." Also, a contributing factor of the album was the involvement of Mike Patton in the creative process of the album, and the difficulties brought on by guitarist Jim Martin.
Mike Patton's involvement behind the writing and creativity helped give the band a solid understanding of the sound they were looking for. He had brought unconventional writing methods that involved creating lyrics for the first two tracks "Land of Sunshine" and "Caffeine" while intentionally sleep-deprived and taking inspiration from fortune cookies and the Oxford Capacity Analysis, a personality test from the Church of Scientology (“Patton fanatic,” 2016).
Each member of the band had some, if not a lot of input in each other's instruments in the process, there were trials, errors and suggestions brought up by members of the band that could not play the recording instrument, yet would bring an appropriate contribution to the sound and techniques. However, tensions rose with guitarist Jim Martin as he did not appreciate the direction the band was going and would not show up for recording sessions with the full band. Producer, Matt Wallace had stated, "I believe that Bill played on about 60-70% of the guitars. The band were really at odds at this point. Patton, Gould, Bottum, and Bordin and I would track the stuff and then they would leave. Martin would come in after they had left and play guitar. The following day the band would come in to listen to what Jim had recorded and were furious (“Matt Wallace reflects on producing Angel Dust,” 2010)." This shows how Martin had conflicting opinions and attitudes of the production and would behave poorly by not showing up with the rest of the band and not allowing them to contribute to the soundscape of the guitars, ultimately having a majority of guitars done by bassist Bill Gould.
References:
Buckley, P. (2003). The rough guide to rock. Rough Guides.
Chadbowar. (2015, April 23). Faith no more plan “the real thing” + “Angel Dust” Reissues Retrieved from http://loudwire.com/faith-no-more-reissue-the-real-thing-angel-dust-albums/
Matt Wallace reflects on producing Angel Dust. (2010, September 21). Retrieved from Faith No More 2.0, http://newfaithnomore.com/2010/09/21/matt-wallace-reflects-on-producing-angel-dust/
Patton fanatic. (2016, April 21). Retrieved from Faith No More, https://pattonfanatic.com/mike-patton-lyrics-land-of-sunshine/
