Day 0882 - Make Yourself

Incubus “Make Yourself” (1999) – got it

Though I feel their last few releases have been on a slight downward turn, I am a big fan of Incubus’ first slew of albums.

Make Yourself sees them at the height of their “Nu-Metal” phase, though it seems unfair to lump them in with either that genre or “Rap-Metal” which were both starting to run rampant at the time.  They share the turntables, the “phat” bass sound and the quiet verse/loud chorus format favoured by those genres, but they inject a lot more variety, musicality and experimentation into the mix.

At the time they were one of those 'greater than the sum of its parts' bands.   Drummer Jose Pasillas III has a great groove with occasional flash (as and where required), bassist Dirk Lance brings the aforementioned 'phatness' and some funk undertones to the rock sound.   DJ Chris Kilmore doesn't just chuck in a few 'wicky wicky' scratches, or he does some of that, but also creates a whirling dervishes of noise in places and supplies ambient audio-beds elsewhere, such as on the chorus of whale-song that opens "The Warmth".   Vocalist Brandon Boyd has a great voice and some interesting lyrics and he can really stack some power in his delivery.   Guitarist Michael Einziger to my mind though is the biggest star. His range of guitar tones pushed through various effects pedals can sound almost aquatic, or clean and dancing, or fuzzed out and bombastic.

The opening track "Privilege" is a rousing rocker with a funk groove to it.  The funk vibe reappears throughout, most notably in the instrumental backing for the DJ 'battle' track "Battlestar Scraaltchlactica".   There are pleasing alt-rock ballads in "I Miss You" and the acoustic MTV favourite "Drive".    Track "Consequence" features a guitar break in the middle that is pretty much just a note run through nearly every effects pedal at once.   Then there's the djembe intro to groovy rocker "Clean".

That they manage to do all of this, constantly switching between sounds and still keep the album down to just above the punchy 45-minute mark just adds pleasure to the listening experience.