Is it just us, or has 2016 been the year of the supergroup? We swear, every month we’re greeted with a press release touting another star-studded supergroup who somehow found the time to produce a complete album.
It’s an epidemic that has long stalked the heavy music world (not that it’s a bad thing or anything), but it’s now begun branching out into other genres, including the indie world.
With so many collaborations happening, we decided to take a look at some of the coolest supergroups to come about in 2016 and dissect whether the music they make is as exciting as the names making it.
Gone Is Gone
Members: Troy Sanders (Mastodon), Troy Van Leeuwen (Queens Of The Stone Age), Tony Hajjar (At The Drive-In), Mike Zarin
It seems basically every heavy supergroup that comes about these days has to feature at least one member of Mastodon. We’re guessing that’s one of those pieces of legislation that parliament snuck through overnight like the lockout laws.
But hey, we’re not complaining. Whenever you see big names like Mastodon and Queens of the Stone Age attached to a project, you’re immediately skeptical about whether the project can really be bigger than the sum of its parts.
In the case of Gone Is Gone, tracks like ‘Violescent’ sound like an even mix of all of the ‘source’ bands involved. Sure, the inclusion of Sanders’s vocals certainly Mastodon-ify things quite a bit, but those yawning guitar bends are pure QOTSA and Hajjar’s drums are crisp but busy.
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Prophets of Rage
Members: Tom Morello (Rage Against The Machine), Brad Wilk (RATM), Tim Commerford (RATM), Chuck D (Public Enemy), B-Real (Cypress Hill)
Arguably the most talked-about supergroup of the year, Prophets of Rage is what you get when you take three quarters of Rage Against the Machine and once again pair them with a vocal section that isn’t Zack de La Rocha, but also isn’t Chris Cornell.
The result isn’t quite as epic, but it’s perfect once you consider the times. The world was crying out for a protest band and we got them. B-Real and Chuck D don’t have the bratty urgency of De La Rocha, but their vocal delivery is beefier and they rely far more on lyrics than sloganeering.
Sure, when we first saw those posters go up, we were just like you, crossing our fingers and toes and excitedly jumping up and down in our seats as we prepared for the RATM reunion. Prophets of Rage is no RATM, but they’re the perfect protest band for 2016.
Crystal Fairy
Members: Buzz Osborne (Melvins), Dale Crover (Melvins), Omar Rodriguez-López (At the Drive-In/The Mars Volta), Teri Gender Bender (Le Butcherettes)
The most recent supergroup to come about in 2016 is also one of the most intriguing. Neither Osborne nor Rodriguez-López have never involved themselves in any project they don’t feel is making 100 percent vital, interesting music.
In fact, each of the bands involved — the Melvins, The Mars Volta/At The Drive-In, Le Butcherettes — are noted for their oddball tendencies. It helps, too, that Crystal Fairy’s self-titled debut album is being put out by Ipecac Recordings, Mike Patton’s label.
That said, the only single we’ve heard from the band so far, ‘Drugs on the Bus’, sounds a lot like a lost Melvins track just with vocals courtesy of Gender Bender (who, we must say, sounds surprisingly doom-y when matched with Osborne’s lurching riffs).
LIV
Members: Lykke Li, Andrew Wyatt (Miike Snow), Pontus Winberg (Miike Snow), Björn Yttling (Peter Bjorn and John), Jeff Bhasker
It seems most of the time when we hear about supergroups forming, it’s members of the heavy music community. We mentioned before that there’s always a requisite member of Mastodon, and let’s face it, it’s usually Troy.
That’s why the prospect of LIV is so intriguing – partly because it doesn’t come from the heavy music world, but also because the names it features, who all hail from the indie world, are all known for making memorable, original music.
The group recently unveiled a very NSFW video directed by Li herself for the single ‘Wings of Love’. The shimmering, retro-sounding number arrives just in time for the summer and sounds like a ’60s pop song if it was written in 2016.
Giraffe Tongue Orchestra
Members: William DuVall (Alice In Chains), Brent Hinds (Mastodon), Ben Weinman (The Dillinger Escape Plan), Pete Griffin (Dethklok), Thomas Pridgen (The Mars Volta)
Move over, Troy, Brent wants some side-project action too. “We certainly didn’t want to sound like one of our other bands,” is what Ben Weinman told Rolling Stone. Weinman who, it should be noted, founded one of the most impossible-to-sound-like bands in existence.
Then again, if anybody could sound like The Dillinger Escape Plan, it’s the founder of The Dillinger Escape Plan. That said, Giraffe Tongue Orchestra certainly have shades of Dillinger, but it’s more that it bears shades of Weinman.
By the same token, without Jerry Cantrell’s gloomy walls of guitar, you wonder how William DuVall ever garnered comparisons to Layne Staley. As for Hinds, his riffs and licks are still as sharp and elusive as a butterfly knife, but each member is given room to run free before meeting in the middle.
This is an orchestra that chases you into a funnel and hunts you down, like a pack of wolves.
