Colonel Claypool's Bucket of Bernie Brains, "The Big Eyeball in the Sky" (Prawn Song, 2004)
If only for curiosity's sake, one of the highlights of the 2002 Bonnaroo Festival was the seemingly odd grouping of Primus bass player Les Claypool, P-Funk keyboardist Bernie Worrell, virtuoso guitarist Buckethead and a drummer named Brain (actually, Brian Mantia).
The quartet, billed as Colonel Claypool's Bucket of Bernie Brains, also proved a musical highlight during its nearly two-hour set of improvisational jamming. An excerpt that appears on the DVD collection from the festival, called "Number Two," gives a brief picture of the performance: Les, dressed kind of like Alex in "A Clockwork Orange," flails away in his inimitable style, while the masked Buckethead - KFC-style bucket perched atop his cranium - stares straight ahead while playing some unbelievable riffs.
Viewers and listeners who thought the Bonnaroo gig represented a one-off deal were pleasantly surprised two years later when the four musicians recorded a studio album, "The Big Eyeball in the Sky," released on the specialty label for Claypool/Primus.
The song-oriented approach to the album is a marked departure from the free-form playing at Bonnaroo. (My kids, having seen the DVD, were kind of disappointed that "The Big Eyeball in the Sky" didn't continue in that vein.) The result is an amalgam of what makes each of the musicians distinctive: Worrell's otherworldly synthesizer playing, which he helped pioneer with Funkadelic/Parliament in the '70s; Buckethead's rapid-fire, heavily distored guitar playing; and Claypool's utterly quirky rhythmic approach, bass slapping and singing style. Not to mention Les' lyrics; check out these lines in the biographical ditty "Buckethead": "He stood like great Ulysses with guitar in his hand/Pledging to deflate the cynical that plague the glory land." Brain has played with Claypool in Primus and Buckethead during their stint together in Guns N' Roses, so he knows how to fit right in with their styles.
The lyrics take on a political bent at thimes, most notably on the title track and the set closer, "Ignorance Is Bliss." The former presents an Orwellian theme, by way of the current state of television: "But to formulate opinions, from what I see, is a joke/Because American TV's owned by Pepsi and by Coke." The latter takes issue with the current administration: "Well, the market's on the boil, we're down a couple quarts of oil/The president is reacting like an old near-sighted mohel."
The music isn't that far of a departure from Claypool's work with Primus and his other projects, including Oysterhead, Sausage and Colonel Claypool's Flying Frog Brigade: It's busy and noisy, but very engaging, particularly with Worrell and Brian Carroll (as Buckethead's parents named him) trading expertly played solos.
Whether this particular quartet will do anymore work together remains to be seen, but "The Big Eyeball in the Sky" represents a junction of musical styles and skills that fans of any of the players involved should find interesting.
If only for curiosity's sake, one of the highlights of the 2002 Bonnaroo Festival was the seemingly odd grouping of Primus bass player Les Claypool, P-Funk keyboardist Bernie Worrell, virtuoso guitarist Buckethead and a drummer named Brain (actually, Brian Mantia).
The quartet, billed as Colonel Claypool's Bucket of Bernie Brains, also proved a musical highlight during its nearly two-hour set of improvisational jamming. An excerpt that appears on the DVD collection from the festival, called "Number Two," gives a brief picture of the performance: Les, dressed kind of like Alex in "A Clockwork Orange," flails away in his inimitable style, while the masked Buckethead - KFC-style bucket perched atop his cranium - stares straight ahead while playing some unbelievable riffs.
Viewers and listeners who thought the Bonnaroo gig represented a one-off deal were pleasantly surprised two years later when the four musicians recorded a studio album, "The Big Eyeball in the Sky," released on the specialty label for Claypool/Primus.
The song-oriented approach to the album is a marked departure from the free-form playing at Bonnaroo. (My kids, having seen the DVD, were kind of disappointed that "The Big Eyeball in the Sky" didn't continue in that vein.) The result is an amalgam of what makes each of the musicians distinctive: Worrell's otherworldly synthesizer playing, which he helped pioneer with Funkadelic/Parliament in the '70s; Buckethead's rapid-fire, heavily distored guitar playing; and Claypool's utterly quirky rhythmic approach, bass slapping and singing style. Not to mention Les' lyrics; check out these lines in the biographical ditty "Buckethead": "He stood like great Ulysses with guitar in his hand/Pledging to deflate the cynical that plague the glory land." Brain has played with Claypool in Primus and Buckethead during their stint together in Guns N' Roses, so he knows how to fit right in with their styles.
The lyrics take on a political bent at thimes, most notably on the title track and the set closer, "Ignorance Is Bliss." The former presents an Orwellian theme, by way of the current state of television: "But to formulate opinions, from what I see, is a joke/Because American TV's owned by Pepsi and by Coke." The latter takes issue with the current administration: "Well, the market's on the boil, we're down a couple quarts of oil/The president is reacting like an old near-sighted mohel."
The music isn't that far of a departure from Claypool's work with Primus and his other projects, including Oysterhead, Sausage and Colonel Claypool's Flying Frog Brigade: It's busy and noisy, but very engaging, particularly with Worrell and Brian Carroll (as Buckethead's parents named him) trading expertly played solos.
Whether this particular quartet will do anymore work together remains to be seen, but "The Big Eyeball in the Sky" represents a junction of musical styles and skills that fans of any of the players involved should find interesting.
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