Digital Garbage
Since the late ’80s, Mudhoney – the Seattle-based foursome whose
muck-crusted version of rock, shot through with caustic wit and
battened down by a ferocious low end – has been a high-pH tonic
against the ludicrous and the insipid.
Thirty years later, the world is experiencing a particularly high-water
moment for both those ideals. But just in time, vocalist Mark Arm,
guitarist Steve Turner, bassist Guy Maddison, and drummer Dan
Peters are back with Digital Garbage, a barbed-wire-trimmed
collection of sonic brickbats. Arm’s raw yawp and his bandmates’
long-honed chemistry make Digital Garbage an ideal release valve for
the 2018 pressure cooker. “My sense of humor is dark, and these are
dark times,” says Arm. “I suppose it’s only getting darker.”
Digital Garbage opens with the swaggering “Nerve Attack,” which can
be heard as a nod both to modern-life anxiety and the ever-increasing
threat of warfare. The album’s title comes from the outro of “Kill
Yourself Live,” which segues from a revved-up Arm organ solo into a
bleak look at the way notoriety goes viral. Arm says: “people really
seem to find validation in the likes—and then there’s Facebook Live,
where people have streamed torture and murder, or, in the case of
Philando Castile, getting murdered by a cop. In the course of writing
that song, I thought about how, once you put something out there
online, you can’t wipe it away. It’s always going to be there—even if
no one digs it up, it’s still out there floating somewhere.”
Appropriately enough, bits of recent news events float through the
record: “Please Mr. Gunman,” on which Arm bellows “We’d rather die
in church!” over his bandmates’ careening charge, was inspired by a
TV-news bubblehead’s response to a 2017 church shooting, while the
ominous refrain that opens the submerged-blues of “Next Mass
Extinction” calls back to last summer’s clashes in Charlottesville.
Mudhoney’s core sound—steadily pounding drums, swamp-thing
bass, squalling guitar wobble, Arm’s hazardous-chemical
voice—remains on Digital Garbage, which the band recorded with
longtime collaborator (and Digital Garbage pianist) Johnny Sangster at
the Seattle studio Litho. The anti-religiosity shimmy “21st Century
Pharisees” builds its case with Maddison’s woozy synths, which Arm
says “add a really nice touch to the proceedings.” Digital Garbage closes with “Oh Yeah,” a brief celebration of skateboarding, surfing,
biking, and the joy provided by these escape valves. “I would’ve really
just loved to write songs about just hanging out on the beach, and
going on a nice vacation,” says Arm. “But, you know, that probably
doesn’t make for great rock.”
Mudhoney, however, know what does make great rock—and the riffs
and fury of Digital Garbage will stand the test of time, even if the
particulars fade away. “I’ve tried to keep things somewhat universal,
so that this album doesn’t just seem like of this time—hopefully some
of this stuff will go away,“ Arm laughs. “You don’t want to say in the
future, ‘Hey, those lyrics are still relevant. Great!’”
