Oh, the party boat is here. Released in 1995 through Eastwest Records, which at the time was under Atlantic, the self-titled sophomore full-length from Maryland groove rockers Clutch is a founding document of stoner-heavy in the 1990s. Distinguished by its funk-informed bounce, hardcore undertones carried over from the four-piece band’s earlier days — their debut, Transnational Speedway League: Anthems, Anecdotes And Undeniable Truths (discussed here), came out in ’93 — and its depth of quirk in the lyrical storytelling of Neil Fallon, it not only defined the path Clutch would take over the nearly three decades since, but has been a point of inspiration for two generations of bands since. In the riffs of Tim Sult, Dan Maines‘ smooth low end groove that, for this record alone, hell, for “Droid” alone, deserves a statue carved somewhere in its honor but nobody makes statues for bassists, and Jean-Paul Gaster‘s purposefully tinny-sounding snare popping through no with no less personality than Fallon‘s vocal on “Animal Farm” while highlighting and complementing the intricacy of Sult‘s start-stop patterns or the release of tension as “Big News I” turns over to “Big News II” at the outset, the band itself was very much the biggest news of all.

It is a genre landmark, pairing restless energy and languid flow. “Rock ‘n’ Roll Outlaw” and “Big News II” border on rap-rock — there, I said it; feels good after all this time — and but that was fair game in 1995, and the recording by Larry “Uncle Punchy” Packer is so raw and so distinctly not nü-metal in the style it’s playing toward that they were never really seen as such. Fair enough. “Escape From the Prison Planet” and “I Have the Body of John Wilkes Booth” have a hip-hop element too, but again, context applies when you’re setting that next to the ultimate chill of “Spacegrass” or the wah and swing and gruff vocals of “The House that Peterbilt,” the organ-laced jamming that closes out in “Tim Sult vs. the Greys” answering back to the riffing on “Big News I,” but fast enough to not necessarily be a full reprise for a song that’s already broken into two parts.

The left-unmatched vocal layering of “7 Jam,” the rush of “Animal Farm” and immediate turnover to “Tight Like That,” which seems to sneer in its later hook but remains one of the most infectious songs Clutch has ever done — and this record is full of them — Clutch bends tempo and expectation to suit the band’s purposes, and constructs a band persona on the strength of its songwriting. As much as Clutch have come to be embodied by their touring ethic and how they present themselves onstage, whether that’s Fallon as the sometimes-mad frontman, Gaster bouncing out of his seat in back, or the calm presences of Sult and Maines on either side, the part this material has played in solidifying their character as a group can’t and shouldn’t be denied. A lot of records go where they want to. Clutch‘s self-titled does that and makes every step the band takes feel like an audience invitation to the party. Also it’s on a boat!

At 13 songs and 55 minutes, it’s very much a CD-era release, but if it feels long by modern get-to-it-and-get-out vinyl standards of 40-45 minutes at the most, that time differential is invariably well spent. “7 Jam” brings a looseness and swagger between “I Have the Body of John Wilkes Booth” and “Tight Like That,” while “Animal Farm” takes off on a sprint that gives everything around it an underpinning of immediacy. “Droid” rolls through its mellower flow in a way that makes a nod of its repeating measures, but is a blueprint for mid-’90s stoner rock groove that’s still being followed nearly 30 years later, and even “Tim Sult vs. the Greys” adds something to the procession, and no, I’m not just talking about the organ that shows up there (not for the first time on the record) in bookending with “Big News I” and letting the band ride out easy and hypnotic.

Is it the best Clutch record? It’s definitely in the running, and I have no doubt there’s an entire contingent who got on board when it came out — I remember hearing “Spacegrass” on WSOU and KROQ around then and being curious, but my teenaged self sought angstier and, frankly, dumber fare and it wasn’t until a few years later, between 2001’s Pure Rock Fury and 2004’s Blast Tyrant (discussed here), when I was at WSOU, that I actually became a fan. If you look at the span of the band’s catalog over the last 30-plus years, laden as it is with collections, special editions, live records and such, it’s arguably the first of several landmarks they’ve offered.

It’s not the fairest of questions in the first place since the band’s records vary so much depending on what they’re going for sound-wise, their bluesier period sparked by Blast Tyrant that led into the quick turnaround of 2005’s Robot Hive/Exodus (reissue review here), or 2013’s charged realignment in Earth Rocker (review here) — it’s not a discography short on highlights, and whether or not it’s a favorite for a given listener, over the better part of the last 30 years — an anniversary that the band will likely mark in some way touring (possibly also for a new album) in 2025, even if they don’t own the rights to actually reissue it; I don’t know how much obtaining such a thing would cost, but it has to be in the hundreds of thousands of dollars; Kickstarter preorders, anyone? — both the record itself and the songs featured on it have stood any test of time and trend one might want to apply. After a certain point, the “best” just becomes a thing to debate on the internet. Clutch are in a league of their own. This record helped them get there.

Clutch are on tour with Fu Manchu supporting as of last night, playing Blast Tyrant in its entirety, so of course something like that is possible for the self-titled as well. Whatever comes or doesn’t in that regard, the band will surely keep moving forward as the buzz around new material in progress has already begun and they’ll reportedly look to record sometime next year. In the interim, and as always, I hope you enjoy revisiting this one.

—

That tour — Clutch and the Fu — started last night in Brooklyn. After running Clutch songs through my brain all week, I decided to see when they were coming around yesterday and I found Fu Manchu on social media being like “We go on in New York in like an hour!” Okay then. I couldn’t have gone anyway as The Patient Mrs. is at a conference last night, today/tonight and early tomorrow and I was on kid duty — don’t worry, I’ll get my time next week at Desertfest NYC — but I did have a chuckle at the timing. I’d have bought a Fu Manchu CD, and a Clutch t-shirt is always something good to have in the house, even if the band’s fanbase can be a lot to take at shows sometimes. At least in Jersey. I don’t know how it unfolds in Brooklyn. Either way, I missed the party boat.

School started this week, on Tuesday. After I got home from dropoff a bit ago — made myself a leftover-chicken-meatloaf sandwich on chaffles in the air fryer; not slumming it on breakfast — I sprayed the bees again (hang on I’ll get there) and settled in thinking how well the first two weeks of school have gone for The Pecan, only to remember that it actually hasn’t even been one full week yet. I’m just relieved she’s (apparently) not hitting anybody, happy to not be getting the call to come pick her up or whatever that started coming in last year. She was pretty ambivalent about starting school again, but I have yet to argue with her on actually going into the building. You take your wins where you can get them.

And on that note, I’ll mention as well that we’ve been getting along decently well. Part of that is an active rethinking on her behavior — she’s not defiant, she’s sensory-seeking, anxious and often overwhelmed and arguing allows her to feel some aspect of control in her life. I won’t say I never yell at her, but it’s been a while since I’ve actually felt like I needed to raise my voice to do anything more than get her attention while she’s hyperfocused on whatever video she’s watching in the evening. On a certain level, she’s always going to be argumentative. If this becomes self-advocacy skill, it will be a strength. If she’s just a prick, well, at least she’ll have come by it honestly from my end of things. Like the card that The Patient Mrs. gave me for Father’s Day reads from the fridge: “We did this to ourselves.”

But about the bees, because yes, there are bees. There have been since we got back from Budapest, now almost a month ago. They were living in the casing of a 50-year-old air conditioner embedded into the wall of our dining room/back bar — we call it the Big Room because, well, it’s biggest room in the house — that, until it was turned on to cool off, still worked. The motor on the fan blew I guess after bumping into the hive of yellowjackets, and that was that. The Patient Mrs. and I both sprayed vigorously, but ultimately couldn’t kill the hive. I know bees are pollinators and there’s an environmental crisis, but I’m sorry, I just can’t live with either the busted A/C or bees coming out of it into my house — if that makes me a bad person, and it might, so be it — so the large, bulky and heavy unit had to come out of the wall. The Patient Mrs. and I did that earlier this week — first day of school, Tuesday, I think it was — and sprayed again.

And again, and again. Raid hasn’t done much to acquit itself, but I keep buying more so I guess they’re doing something right. I sprayed a whole can yesterday and picked up four more this morning. Two are gone already and the bees continue to look for a new nesting spot in front of the house. When we took the A/C out of the wall, we put it on the patio, so I guess they’re like “WTF happened to our house bro?” and trying to set up somewhere else. But the town came this morning and picked up the thing itself with its big grabbing-arm-truck and so they’re just basically poking around in the loose stones of our front steps and the cracks in the foundation from the last however many decades. I’ll spray again in the afternoon/evening and see where we’re at. It might require professional intervention, which of course is money I’d rather not spend. Not the least with the Zelda Lego Deku Tree set coming out.

Will be interesting to see which way it goes. I didn’t get to write as much this week as I’d hoped — I wanted to slip an Elephant Tree review in there too, since their anniversary collection is out today — but I’m happy with what I wrote, so fair enough. It’d never be enough anyway. Reviewing Thunderbird Divine, Curse the Son, Psychedelic Source, Delving and Howling Giant (coffee) is actually pretty solid for a week, and it’s nice to do things separate from the ‘event’ of a premiere. Feels oldschool as regards my Obelisk processes. Next week I’ve got Slomosa, Elephant Tree, and Tranquonauts slated, plus a Spirit Mother premiere for Thursday and then Friday begins coverage of the aforementioned Desertfest New York. We’ll see if I can get through it all. Would be nice.

I hope you have a great and safe weekend. Hydrate, watch your head, all that stuff. I’ve been wondering if I should try to get a Fall/Winter merch drop going, so if you have any opinion on that, be it “nah I’m good” or “yeah I could use a hoodie,” please let me know in the comments. Otherwise, back Monday, and thanks again for reading.

FRM.

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Tags: Clutch, Clutch Self-titled, Eastwest Records, Maryland, self-titled

This entry was posted on Friday, September 6th, 2024 at 11:44 am and is filed under Bootleg Theater. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.