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Emerging from the US punk underground, they unwittingly became MTV\u2019s alternative rock poster boys before alienating their entire audience and collapsing in a pool of their own vitriol. In 2015, eighteen years on from their last album, Faith No More\u2019s unlikely return remained anchored in anger and indignation\u2026<\/p>\n
[\/et_pb_text][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/flatplan-plus-content.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2024\/03\/GettyImages-565152437-scaled.jpg” title_text=”Portrait Of Faith No More” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text module_class=”image-gallery-caption” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” text_font=”|300|||||||” text_font_size=”16px” text_line_height=”1.2em” custom_margin=”-10px||||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”]<\/p>\n
Introduce Yourself: Faith No More (front row, l-r) Billy Gould and Mike Bordin, (back row, l-r) Jim Martin, Mike Patton and Roddy Bottum. Chicago, Illinois 1990.<\/p>\n
[\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”text-with-dropcap” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”]<\/p>\n
A one-time vaudeville house that was formerly a regular haunt of The Grateful Dead, tonight the stage at San Francisco\u2019s Warfield Theater is decked in white and decorated with several florists\u2019 worth of blooms, resembling a funeral in negative. The vibe is hardly sombre, however, the capacity crowd of 2,300 expressing an electric, impatient anticipation, hollering and stomping their feet. House lights dim and screams erupt as a spotlight tracks a figure walking onstage \u2013 not a member of the group, but a man dressed head-to-toe in black leather, sporting a gimp mask, who stands mute and static onstage. He will stay there during several songs in a gesture that, in its perverse absurdity, seems both very<\/em>\u00a0San Francisco, and very<\/em>\u00a0Faith No More.<\/p>\n \n<\/div>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”]<\/p>\n Their last show in their hometown, in 2010, was Faith No More\u2019s first on North American soil in over a decade, part of the Second Coming reunion tour that criss-crossed the globe over 87 shows between 2009 and 2012. That this epic (and lucrative) sortie only took in nine shows in the US perhaps reflects how these prophets of rage were ignored in their home-country after 1992\u2019s Angel Dust wrong-footed their fanbase. By the time Faith No More announced their dissolution in 1998 \u2013 bidding sayonara with a maudlin cover of The Bee Gees\u2019 I Started A Joke, the acerbic five-piece realising the joke was finally on them \u2013 America hardly seemed to care.<\/p>\n Now, everything is different. \u201cWe\u2019re much more popular now than when we split up,\u201d beams bassist Bill Gould, speaking earlier that day. Maturity and a fondness for each other bred by absence, meanwhile, has also softened their previously brutal internal dynamic. \u201cWe were young, and we just weren\u2019t very good with each other,\u201d he acknowledges. \u201cWe knew each other\u2019s soft spots, and would lay into them.\u201d Tonight, however, a pre-show huddle in the dressing room is scored not by savage zings but good-humoured guffaws, leading drummer Mike \u2018Puffy\u2019 Bordin to tell MOJO, as they troop to the stage, \u201cYou want to know what life in Faith No More is like now? Uproarious fuckin\u2019 laughter!\u201d<\/p>\n The show itself is scintillating, touring the vast sprawl of Faith No More\u2019s sound \u2013 from the feral wall-of-noise assaults of Caffeine, to pop-savvy rap-metal anthem Epic, to a straight-faced cover of The Commodores\u2019 MOR classic Easy (an unlikely UK Number 1 in 1993) \u2013 with a venom too vivid for mere nostalgia. Songs are plucked from Sol Invictus, their unexpected and widely acclaimed new album, announcing that for Faith No More, the reunion phase is over; now it\u2019s time for the rebirth.<\/p>\n This turn of events clearly sits well with frontman Mike Patton, whose fearsome post-FNM workload suggested a man trying to put his past as far behind him as humanly possible. Tonight, as the lunatic fairground-ride of Land Of Sunshine draws to a close, he stands at the lip of the stage, pulls down the blood-red bandana across his face and unveils what can only be described as the shit-eating grin of vindication.<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”pull-quote” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” header_2_text_align=”center” header_2_text_color=”#111111″ header_2_font_size=”46px” header_2_line_height=”1.2em” custom_margin=”||0px||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”]<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”pullquote-name” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” header_2_text_align=”center” header_2_font_size=”46px” header_2_line_height=”1.2em” header_3_text_align=”center” header_3_text_color=”#111111″ header_3_font_size=”38px” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”]<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_divider color=”#111111″ module_class=”custom-divider” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” custom_margin=”||0px||false|false” custom_padding=”||0px||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][\/et_pb_divider][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”]<\/p>\n \u201cWe didn\u2019t fit in with anybody,\u201d remembers Bill Gould, of Faith No More\u2019s earliest days. The group began in the early 80s, after Gould, drummer Bordin and keyboardist Roddy Bottum initiated a bloodless coup within Faith. No Man, the group 18-year-old LA native Gould joined a week after moving to San Francisco, ejecting mid-20s goth-loving singer Mike Morris. \u201cI grew up on The Germs and Black Flag. I wasn\u2019t into posing around in a dark coat,\u201d smiles Gould, in one of the many teal-walled dressing rooms beneath The Warfield.<\/p>\n With Bordin under the spell of African percussion teacher CK Ladzepco, the trio swapped trad rock rhythms for epic, circular jams, playing with a slew of singers and guitarists at the few clubs in San Francisco that would book them. \u201cWe were about pushing buttons, instigating provocation,\u201d remembers Bottum. One early vocalist, Courtney Love, excelled at the latter. \u201cShe was very extroverted,\u201d grins Gould. \u201cShe would get up in the audience\u2019s faces. She was not passive at all \u2013 people hated her! And we loved it.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n They picked up a guitarist, Jim Martin, who\u2019d formerly played with Puffy and best friend, Metallica bassist Cliff Burton, in bar-band EZ Street. \u201cWe wanted a sound like the first Killing Joke record,\u201d says Bottum, \u201cReally tough, metal, aggro guitar, without solos and without the dumb attitude. And with Jim, we got a little of the attitude.\u201d Martin, Bottum says admiringly, was a \u201cweirdo\u201d, a misfit even within this group of misfits, who often enjoyed wearing multiple pairs of glasses at once. \u201cWe were total extremes,\u201d says Bottum. \u201cHe was a total redneck, a macho, gun-totin\u2019, truck-drivin\u2019 dude. I was a fruity, open-minded gay guy. We fought all the time, but I really liked him.\u201d<\/p>\n Love, meanwhile, was replaced by Chuck Mosley, an old bandmate of Gould\u2019s. \u201cWhenever we\u2019d play in LA, Chuck would hang out,\u201d says Gould. \u201cSo we said, \u2018Hey, there\u2019s a microphone, there\u2019s some beer, just start screaming.\u2019 He was never a \u2018singer\u2019, but he had a great persona onstage, charming and really funny.\u201d<\/p>\n Their debut album arrived in 1985, the maiden release by San Francisco indie Mordam Records. Its title track, We Care A Lot, was Faith No More\u2019s first great song, welding Martin\u2019s heavy-rock guitar to sparse funk and a rap puncturing of the pomposity of the Live Aid generation through its blackened lyricism. \u201cWe care a lot about disease \/ Baby, Rock Hudson, rock!\u201d sang Mosley on the track released in the same year that the actor became the first high profile victim of AIDS.<\/p>\n \u201cWe were very sarcastic,\u201d says Bottum, in what is a glorious understatement. \u201cAnd that\u2019s where We Care A Lot came from: it drew on the stuff we loved \u2013 Soulsonic Force, Kraftwerk, the first Run DMC album \u2013 while poking fun at modern culture and the media, stuff we thought was stupid.\u201d<\/p>\n A second album, 1987\u2019s Introduce Yourself, on Slash Records, refined Faith No More\u2019s multifarious formula, but, says Gould, \u201cMorale was horrible.\u201d The source of the misery was Mosley, who often arrived at gigs with the band were already onstage, and, apparently exhausted, fell asleep onstage before an influential industry audience at the Introduce Yourself launch party at LA\u2019s Club Lingerie.<\/p>\n \u201cI exploded at him a couple of times,\u201d says Gould. \u201cWe were at a gas station in Kentucky once, we\u2019d driven all night, and he yelled at me, and I kicked him, and he started swinging at me like a wild man, and he broke his finger on the steering wheel. He was a good friend; I literally loved the guy. But we just had to make a change.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_divider color=”#111111″ module_class=”custom-divider” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” custom_margin=”||0px||false|false” custom_padding=”||0px||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][\/et_pb_divider][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/flatplan-plus-content.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2024\/03\/GettyImages-494325996-scaled.jpg” title_text=”2015 Monster Energy Aftershock Festival” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text module_class=”image-gallery-caption” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” text_font=”|300|||||||” text_font_size=”16px” text_line_height=”1.2em” custom_margin=”-10px||||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”]<\/p>\n The Real Thing: Mike Patton and Faith No More onstage at the Aftershock Festival, Sacramento, California in 2015.\u00a0<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”]<\/p>\n \u201cWhen did I realise I had a remarkable voice?\u201d asks Mike Patton, archly raising an eyebrow in the Warfield dressing room. Not one to suffer fools, he repeats what appears to him to be a stupid question. \u201cThere\u2019s not these watershed moments that look great in print. It\u2019s a process. I\u2019ve got a muscle, I got to exercise it. Most people run on a treadmill; I scream.\u201d<\/p>\n The voice Patton\u2019s currently downplaying is widely recognised as one of rock\u2019s finest, its six-octave range the result of years of training. You can hear it in nascent form on YouTube footage as a 14-year-old Patton sings Judas Priest, Iron Maiden and Motley Crue with his band Gemini at Eureka High School\u2019s 1984 talent show. A year later, he formed Mr Bungle with schoolmate Trey Spruance. \u201cWe were really into death metal and hardcore,\u201d says Patton. \u201cBut it came out like we were almost a comedy troupe.\u201d<\/p>\n Four years on, the Humboldt County native found himself in the abandoned animal hospital in San Francisco that Faith No More were using as both living quarters and rehearsal space. \u201cHe was like this innocent 19-year-old,\u201d remembers Gould. \u201cHe must have been thinking, \u2018What the fuck am I getting myself into?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n Patton had earlier handed the group a Mr Bungle demo-tape at a gig in Humboldt, \u201cbecause I thought they would get a laugh out of it.\u201d Months later, he started receiving bizarre phone messages from Jim Martin. \u201cHe was like a poet, it was free-association wordplay,\u201d laughs Patton. \u201cI would play them to the band. We thought they might take us on tour. But Jim wanted me to be the new singer. I bet he thought I was some beer-bellied, mean redneck motherfucker.\u201d<\/p>\n Faith No More played Patton their new music. Compared to Mr Bungle, the songs were \u201calmost like pop,\u201d remembers Patton, \u201cand the chord-progressions reminded me of soul music. Death-metal soul music? That\u2019s<\/em>\u00a0not going to work.\u201d But as he improvised vocals over the nascent tunes, Patton realised, \u201cit worked really good!\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cMike had such diversity. He could really sing,\u201d remembers Bottum. \u201cAnd he had a similar sense of humour, laughing at the same things we were laughing at. It was super-clear he was a game-changer. \u2018This is what we sound like with a real singer?\u2019\u201d \u201cHe was this young, innocent-looking kid,\u201d adds Gould. \u201cOur managers were like, \u2018Ooh, we can sell this.\u2019 But he really did \u2018get\u2019 it.\u201d<\/p>\n Patton\u2019s first album with the group, 1989\u2019s The Real Thing was Faith No More\u2019s most accessible release yet, though weirdness still coursed beneath its polished funk-rock surface, also harbouring brutal death-metal stomps, sinister doo-wop excursions and a most gonzoid thrash-prog instrumental entitled Woodpecker From Mars that Bottum refers to as \u201csort-of our take on the cinematic soundscapes of the Lawrence Of Arabia score.\u201d<\/p>\n The band spent ten months touring the album; success was elusive, except in Britain. \u201cI think we played England five times,\u201d says Gould, \u201ca bigger venue every time.\u201d However, a manic 1990 show at London\u2019s Astoria, where fans swarmed the stage, convinced label bigwigs to invest one final bundle of cash in promoting the album. A video was shot for Epic, and MTV finally fell for Patton\u2019s All-American skate-punk looks and the track\u2019s genius fusion of brat-rap and brawn-rock. The Real Thing began selling 20,000 copies a week, en route to sales that would top a million in the US alone.<\/p>\n This long-awaited success, however, proved bittersweet for the group as their audience grew. \u201cThe Real Thing found an audience with the metal kids, which was great,\u201d says Gould. \u201cBut we were being perceived as something we weren\u2019t. And when it came time for the follow-up, people were baying for The Real Thing Part II, and we didn\u2019t want to make it.\u201d<\/p>\n Two years spent on the road promoting The Real Thing, meanwhile, exacted its own price. \u201cI\u2019m sure it scarred us all, turned us into cockroaches rather than human beings,\u201d says Puffy. \u201cIt drives you insane. And then you make an album like Angel Dust\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”pull-quote” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” header_2_text_align=”center” header_2_text_color=”#111111″ header_2_font_size=”46px” header_2_line_height=”1.2em” custom_margin=”||0px||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”]<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”pullquote-name” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” header_2_text_align=”center” header_2_font_size=”46px” header_2_line_height=”1.2em” header_3_text_align=”center” header_3_text_color=”#111111″ header_3_font_size=”38px” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”]<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”]<\/p>\n Released in June 1992, in the era of Lollapalooza and Nirvana\u2019s crossover success, Angel Dust was an explicit response to the success engendered by The Real Thing, a repudiation of whatever their new fans perceived Faith No More as being. \u201cThere was this gross miscalculation that we were some \u2018mall metal\u2019 band,\u201d scowls Patton. \u201cWe needed to be who we were,\u201d adds Gould. \u201cWe wanted to use this moment to do something cool<\/em>, something badass<\/em>.\u201d<\/p>\n Hitherto polymorphous, on Angel Dust Faith No More got perverse. Gone was the glossy funk-metal of yore, replaced by a brilliantly incongruous riot of ideas, ricocheting between bangers that sounded like rave music on a battlefield (A Small Victory), waltzing Waitsian character-sketches (RV), ballistic industrial scourges (Malpractice). Patton was now as likely to scream, gurgle and howl as croon. \u201cWe wanted to go as far as we could,\u201d says Puffy, of the album\u2019s ambitions. \u201cEvolve. That\u2019s what we thought we were supposed to do.\u201d<\/p>\n The response from management and the label was disheartening. \u201cWe played them the album, and they said, \u2018I hope you didn\u2019t buy houses already\u2019,\u201d deadpans Patton. There was dissension within, too: Jim Martin, whose heavy rock moves shaped The Real Thing\u2019s success, saw no reason to change direction, telling journalists he didn\u2019t like the new album. \u201cThat\u2019s when the rift became irreversible,\u201d says Gould. \u201cJim became a threat to our existence.\u201d<\/p>\n A lengthy global tour with Guns\u2019n\u2019Roses only underlined their misfit status. \u201c\u201cWe really fucked with G\u2019n\u2019R,\u201d says Bottum. \u201cWe got kicked off the tour several times for talking shit about them in the press. Backstage at every show they had jacuzzis and fake beaches populated by strippers the road-crew had given laminates the night before. It was bananas. We just laughed at how fucking ridiculous they were.\u201d<\/p>\n Patton, meanwhile, rebelled against his metal pin-up image, hacking off his locks, hiding his boyish good-looks behind a bristling chin-beard, and regaling credulous journalists with tales of shitting in hotel hand-dryers and drinking bootfuls of his own piss onstage. \u201cIt was just me having fun and cracking up my band-members,\u201d he says, downplaying the stories but stopping short of denying them. \u201cWe freaked a lot of people out, but I\u2019d realised, I\u2019m not this person they think I am, and I can mess with them.\u201d<\/p>\n July 1993, the band headlined the inaugural Phoenix Festival in Stratford-Upon-Avon, the final date of the Angel Dust tour. Bottum, hardly ever \u2018in-the-closet\u2019, had recently been \u2018outed\u2019 by the rock press, and asked the crowd, \u201cheard any good rumours lately? It\u2019s all true! Jim is gay!\u201d \u201cEverybody\u2019s quitting!\u201d added Patton. \u201cIt\u2019s all over! It feels great!\u201d<\/p>\n Fired that November, Jim Martin never played onstage with Faith No More again. \u201cIt\u2019s like a high school break-up,\u201d Gould says. \u201cThere\u2019s a lot of pride involved. He maintains he quit the band.\u201d<\/p>\n Gould had hoped that Martin\u2019s exit would knit the remaining members closer together. Instead, Bottum sat out much of 1995\u2019s King For A Day, Fool For A Lifetime, reeling from the deaths of both his father and close friend Kurt Cobain, and entering rehab for heroin addiction. \u201cI didn\u2019t handle it well,\u201d says a regretful Gould. \u201cI got angry at Roddy, like he was holding us back.\u201d \u201cIt was our first real test,\u201d nods Patton, who says the band were \u201call on different pages.\u201d<\/p>\n Patton remembers \u201ca funereal vibe\u201d to the sessions for their sixth full-length, 1997\u2019s Album Of The Year. \u201cIt seemed like a sad time. It\u2019s a sombre record, I think we knew we were at the end.\u201d \u201cNobody in our camp gave a shit about us, gave us any support at all,\u201d adds Gould. The group toured for most of 1997. By spring the next year, the game was up.<\/p>\n The end came with a meeting at Bill Gould\u2019s house. Patton arrived with a bottle of champagne. \u201cI had a speech memorised, I wanted to make a ceremony out of it. And these guys looks at me like I was fucking crazy and said, \u2018Why are you so upset? We agree with you!\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n There were, they say, no real regrets. \u201cThere was a waning of interest,\u201d says Bottum, \u201cand when that happens between close friends, it\u2019s contagious. We all had other stuff we wanted to do. We were ready to turn our backs on it.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/flatplan-plus-content.s3.eu-west-1.amazonaws.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/7\/2024\/03\/R-625311-1303374555.jpeg.jpg” title_text=”R-625311-1303374555.jpeg” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text module_class=”image-gallery-caption” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” text_font=”|300|||||||” text_font_size=”16px” text_line_height=”1.2em” custom_margin=”-10px||||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”]<\/p>\n 1985’s We Care A Lot<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”]<\/p>\n Puffy says the members all had \u201cjobs that kept us busy\u201d during the years after the split. He drummed for Ozzy Osbourne, Roddy pursued his indie-rock group Imperial Teen, while Gould and Patton started their own labels (Koolarrow and Ipecac, respectively), Patton also juggling noise-rock supergroups, collaborations with Bjork, Norah Jones and Massive Attack, an album of covers of 50s\/60s Italian pop, and a plethora of other projects, while Gould produced a number of acts.<\/p>\n If, during those fallow years, there was any demand in a Faith No More reunion, Patton says he didn\u2019t hear about it. \u201cMaybe I was sheltered from it.\u201d \u201cOur old agent sometimes hit me up,\u201d says Gould. \u201cBut I wasn\u2019t even really talking to the guys at that time. We weren\u2019t enemies or anything, there was just a lot of baggage that came with our relationship. The situation had gotten very frustrating towards the end, and it was nice to take a vacation from it.\u201d<\/p>\n Patton says it took \u201ca growing-up phase\u201d before he found himself in touch with his old band-mates again. \u201cIt took time. And also realising I\u2019d spent half of my fucking life with these guys, and actually I really *do like them, and what we did was actually pretty good. We just had to bury some stuff first.\u201d<\/p>\n When it came, the reunion was, unsurprisingly, tentative. \u201cWe were super-conscious,\u201d says Patton. \u201cLike, \u2018Reunions? Who ever does those well? Nobody!\u2019\u201d \u201cIt was strange, how natural it all felt,\u201d admits Gould. \u201cThirteen years went by, and we\u2019re still telling the same jokes.\u201d Still, no one took anything for granted, and there were no guarantees the reunion would remain ongoing. \u201cOn that first batch of shows, all I wanted to do was to say \u2018Thank you\u2019 to the fans,\u201d says Puffy. \u201cBecause I didn\u2019t think we were going to do any more at that point.\u201d<\/p>\n Things seemed to run out of steam following a final show at London\u2019s Brixton Academy in July 2012. Outwardly the group remained dormant through 2013. Summer 2014, however, saw the group support Black Sabbath at Hyde Park\u2019s British Summer Time festival. Unexpectedly, their set featured two brand new songs \u2013 the slow-grind sleaze of Motherfucker (which became their \u2018comeback\u2019 track and, in typical provocative style, unplayable on the radio) and the schizophrenic thrash of Superhero \u2013 to the vintage setlist.<\/p>\n \u201cI always thought we had more music in us, even when we split up,\u201d says Gould. \u201cI was hoping there would be a creative part to the reunion. Still, there was hesitation within the band to do anything to cash in on the reunion; we were just reconnecting as people, to bring cynicism into it… No.\u201d<\/p>\n Late in 2012, and in secret, the group began to work on the new material, which took shape slowly. \u201cWe don\u2019t all live in the same place,\u201d says Gould, who helmed sessions at the group\u2019s Oakland rehearsal space with Puffy and guitarist Jon Hudson (a member since Album Of The Year). Bottum, meanwhile, sometimes travelled in to contribute ideas and work on the nascent songs, and sometimes emailed in parts he\u2019d recorded at home in NYC. \u201cWe\u2019d get a lot of the music together before Patton jumped in and started working on it. We weren\u2019t exactly all jamming in a room together,\u201d he says. Despite its genesis and their fractured past, it\u2019s clear Sol Invictus is nevertheless the product of communal creativity and a sense of genuine focus.<\/p>\n \u201cIf we didn\u2019t like what we came up with, we wouldn\u2019t make a record,\u201d Gould says. \u201cThat was the bottom line.\u201d \u201cIt was a super-scary proposition,\u201d adds Bottum. \u201cI didn\u2019t want to hear that new Pixies album because chances are, they were going to fuck it up. But it was time to do something fresh, or stop doing it altogether. I think we pulled it off, in a good way.\u201d<\/p>\n Revisiting their eclectic, cinematic sound while discovering new vistas and \u2013 most crucial of all \u2013 preserving their uniquely twisted, darkly sardonic character, Sol Invictus has solicited universal praise, emerging as the group\u2019s strongest album since Angel Dust. And the group know it.<\/p>\n For Puffy, the most philosophical member of the group, this creative rebirth is the product of the tough times in-between. \u201cIt took us breaking up to get here,\u201d he says. \u201cTo clean the slate. Because the baggage was piling up and most of it, in hindsight, was fucking petty.\u201d<\/p>\n So is there a future beyond Sol Invictus? \u201cI hate to talk about that shit, I don\u2019t want to jinx it,\u201d says Puffy. \u201cBut it\u2019s like Sinatra said: the second time round, love is lovelier, it\u2019s all so much better, and that\u2019s cool.\u201d<\/p>\n As far as Faith No More are concerned, then, the future really is unwritten. Only a fool would try and guess where it takes them next.<\/p>\n This article originally appeared in issue 260 of MOJO<\/i><\/p>\n<\/div>\n \n<\/div>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_divider color=”#111111″ module_class=”custom-divider” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” custom_margin=”||0px||false|false” custom_padding=”||0px||false|false” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][\/et_pb_divider][et_pb_text module_class=”credit-names” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” text_font_size=”14px” text_orientation=”center” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”]<\/p>\n Words:<\/strong>\u00a0Stevie Chick\u00a0Images:<\/strong>\u00a0Getty<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][\/et_pb_section][et_pb_section fb_built=”1″ module_class=”boxout-container” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” background_color=”#F4F4F4″ custom_margin=”||20px||false|false” locked=”off” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][et_pb_row _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” custom_padding=”0px|15px|15px|15px|false|true” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][et_pb_column type=”4_4″ _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”][et_pb_text module_class=”boxout-header” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” text_font=”|700||on|||||” text_text_color=”#999999″ text_font_size=”20px” header_4_font=”||||||||” background_color=”#111111″ text_orientation=”center” custom_margin=”-1px|-16px||-16px|false|true” custom_padding=”10px|8px|2px|8px|false|true” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”]<\/p>\n Replace this<\/span> text<\/span><\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text module_class=”boxout-subheader” _builder_version=”4.20.4″ _module_preset=”default” text_font_size=”22px” text_orientation=”center” global_colors_info=”{}” theme_builder_area=”post_content”]<\/p>\n Replace this with a subheader<\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][\/et_pb_column][\/et_pb_row][\/et_pb_section]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Test Boxout<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":1189,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_et_pb_use_builder":"on","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1219","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-mojo-presents"],"acf":[],"modified_by":"kschwarz","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1219","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1219"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1219\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1225,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1219\/revisions\/1225"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1189"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1219"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1219"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/flatplanplus.io\/mojo\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1219"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}\u201cBackstage at every show Guns N\u2019 Roses had Jacuzzis and fake beaches populated by strippers. We laughed at how fucking ridiculous they were.\u201d<\/h2>\n
Roddy Bottum<\/h3>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s like Sinatra said: the second time round, love is lovelier.\u201d\u00a0<\/h2>\n
Mike Bordin<\/h2>\n