Tomahawk's new LP picks up where Mike Patton & band left off (stream, new video, Mr Bungle LPs too)
Tomahawk‘s first album in eight years, Tonic Immobility, is out today.
As I wrote in Notable Releases of the Week, Mike Patton is a true lifer, and he’s been on a roll lately. Recent years have seen long-awaited and well-received comebacks from Faith No More and Mr. Bungle, as well as music with his great new band Dead Cross and other various projects, and now Tomahawk have made their own comeback with Tonic Immobility, the band’s first album in over eight years. Patton formed Tomahawk back in 1999 with The Jesus Lizard’s Duane Denison, and — with the exception of 2007’s Native American music-inspired Anonymous — they’ve always kind of existed somewhere between Patton’s usual freakiness and The Jesus Lizard’s hard-hitting post-hardcore. John Stanier (then of Helmet who had just broken up when Tomahawk formed, now of Battles) gives them the firm backbone they need, and while the rhythm section was once rounded out by bassist Kevin Rutmanis (Cows, Melvins), these days the low end is handled by Patton’s Mr. Bungle bandmate Trevor Dunn, who made his debut with the band on 2013’s Oddfellows. There may be eight years and tons of different Mike Patton projects in between Oddfellows and Tonic Immobility, but Tonic Immobility picks up right where its predecessor left off. It feels like classic Tomahawk; it’s loud, heavy, and some of Patton’s most straightforward work but still totally batshit. It also feels new and fresh. You wouldn’t mistake this for one of Tomahawk’s early 2000s albums; the production is warmer and more modern, and it reminds you that Mike Patton is constantly progressing as an artist. His classics never go out of style, and his new stuff doesn’t feel stale or rehashed. He’s always moving forward.
To celebrate the release, they’ve put out a new video for its song “Predators and Scavengers.” “‘Predators and Scavengers’ started out as a general observation on the current ecological climate of our planet,” Duane Denison said. “Perhaps it could also be applied to the socioeconomic climate as well?” Watch the video (directed, animated and produced by Diego Cumplido) below.
You can pick up vinyl copies of Tomahawk’s new album in our store, and we’ve also got several other Mike Patton albums available, including all three of Bungle’s ’90s albums, the comeback albums by Faith No More and Mr. Bungle (on red vinyl), the 2018 Dead Cross EP, Nevermen (featuring Tunde Adebimpe of TV on the Radio), tētēma, and Patton solo material.
If you’re new to Mike Patton, his extremely prolific 35-year-long career can seem overwhelming, so if you’re looking to make sense of it, read the Mike Patton primer that we published on Invisible Oranges this week.
