311, a band which hails from Nebraska, released their fourth major album, "Transistor," last Tuesday. Along with Sublime and No Doubt, 311 reached mainstream popularity last year with MTV's ridiculously heavy airplay of "Down" and "All Mixed Up."
Wildly inconsistent, "Transistor" can almost be seen as a sophomore release since it is the first album since the group gained widespread popularity.
Since Public Enemy's collaboration with Anthrax on "Bring the Noize," the "Judgment Night Soundtrack," and Rage Against the Machine's first album, in the early 1990s, many groups such as 311, Korn, Infectious Grooves and Sublime have been riding on the rap/reggae/funk/metal bandwagon. 311 definitely does not stray too far from the sound that made them popular.
It is interesting to listen to the changes they made since "Music"(1993). "Music" incorporated a lot of funk and songs from that album jammed out.
"Grassroots"(1994) added effected vocals. "311"(1995) is a stripped down, trite version of their two albums: this album gave the impression that they compromised what they enjoyed doing in exchange for a more accessible sound.
With "Transistor," many changes occur: Nick Hexum, guitarist, singer, programmer and half of the vocals, thankfully moves away from rapping. The addition of ambient noise is an interesting idea, but the band went way overboard in putting weird noises here and there.
The majority of tracks have so much noise over the instruments that the ambiance makes a good or fair song much worse.
311 also moves towards a Sublime sound with much more prominent reggae/ska influence.
"Transistor" contains 21 tracks -- according to the group, the plethora of tracks on this album were done to make up for the fact that they did not release an album in 1996(they did release a video for you hard-core 311 fans).
Like the new Wu Tang and Notorious B.I.G. albums, "Transistor" would have been much stronger with only 10 or 11 tracks. Unfortunately, the band seems to favor falling back and recycling the style that made them popular from previous albums as well as choosing quantity over quality.
On the other hand, "Transistor" does include solid tracks; for example, "Use of Time" includes acoustic guitars and builds to a loud chorus. I can't remember a single 311 track that contained acoustic guitars.
Eric Bobo, who does work with the Beastie Boys, plays percussion on "Stealing Happy Hours," as well as two other tracks. "The Continous Life" is another very strong track.
Despite flashes of brilliance, the album's overall sloppiness makes even the good tracks sound poor. Songs like "No Control" remind me of funky tracks from "Music," but the loud chorus with S.A. Martinez laying down a nasal, annoying line kills that song.
The most obvious, and most refreshing, difference between "Transistor" and 311's other albums is the lack of drug references. 311 grew popular in the pot-smoking community with their constant references to weed, High Times, Hydro and incidences with cops.
However, they still make sure that everyone knows that 311 promotes good times over angst.
Unfortunately, 311 seems to have very little say when the topic is not drug-related.
Lyrics like "When I shadow box inside my skull bothered by the senselessness/I wish for the messiah, Indian Woman, Babylon" from "Inner Light Spectrum" give the impression that the band is trying to make their lyrics are profound.
It appears that the group is maturing lyrically, but 311's focus, like the majority of new music out there, is on the music.
The hard-core 311 fan will be psyched for the 21 tracks of trademark style reggae/hip-hop/metal/funk. There are definitely strong ideas, but it always seems that there is an aspect of each song that ruins the vibe.
Nick Hexum and Chad Sexton must have had a great time playing with knobs and switches in adding effects and producing. Unfortunately, this album makes me wonder how much longer the group will last.
