Stone Temple Pilots

Tiny Music (Atlantic)
by Nik Rainey

Some may find the title of Stone Temple Pilots‘ third album, Tiny Music (Atlantic), pleasingly self-deprecatory. For the band most often invoked as the originator of “scrunge” (i.e. fake grunge, a particularly noxious notion to those who never put much stock in the genuine article), the stone-faced combo who eight-handedly reduced the Alternative Nation to the Republic of Self-Parody, to show even the first dim glimmerings of a sense of humor, will probably be enough to set the ever-spinning wheel of critical fortune a-clacking, the pointer headed towards the “Hey-They’re-Not-So-Bad” marker presently shared by the once-sneerworthy likes of Jay Leno and John Travolta. Such are the fickle ways of our arbiters of taste. What was once “out” is “in” again, at least until the next deadline. But to this scribe, the CD’s subtitle, …Songs From the Vatican Gift Shop, is far more evocative, disturbing, and indicative of the quasi-religious relationship we fans have toward music and the place these reprobates hold in it. Although I’m still not sure what place that is.

Let’s see… in the religion of ’90s rock, we can pretty much agree that Cobain is the Christ (even if he did drive the nails in himself). Put him there and other modern rock figures fall into place underneath him: Corgan, Reznor and Vedder as the disciples spreading the gospels of dissipation and self-loathing, Neil Young as Lazarus, Courtney Love as Mary Magdalene… not too hard if you think about it. (I’d call Perry Farrell John the Baptist, not only because he’s most responsible for anointing alt-rock with the waters of commercial potential, but because I’d really like to see his pasty head on a platter.) But what of STP? The knee-jerk reaction would be to call them Judases, but that would imply that they were favored before they betrayed the alternachurch with a stadium-sized kiss, and we know that just isn’t so. Rechristening them the Stoned Pontius Pilates comes to mind as well, but that doesn’t quite fit either (clever, though, huh?). But I feel like I’m getting warmer. Warmer? Wait a minute… is it that obvious? Could it be that Stone Temple Pilots is… (add Church Lady echo here) Satan?!?

Yeah, that seems glib too, but hear me out. If Old Scratch started a rock band, do you honestly think it would sound like Slayer or something? No way, the Devil’s too snaky for that. He’s a trickster, a slick con man… If he comes to our realm, he’s gonna hide his tail in the hope of passing off as someone else, at least until he gets our hemoglobin on the dotted line, right? Now think back to when you first heard these guys on the radio… uh-huh. Had all you Pearl Jam acolytes fooled, didn’t they? Drew you in and trapped ya. Ha. And the hornéd one’s a seductive fucker, too – even when he makes his identity manifest, it’s tough to resist his dark pull. Check out the entry on the Pilots in the Spin Alternative Record Guide – however much the reviewer wants to get behind them, the strain of his struggle is evident in every word: Phrases like “For all that, ‘Interstate Love Song’ is somewhat compellingly wrought” are the words of a man grappling with his bleakest impulses – think of Max von Sydow in The Exorcist and say a silent prayer for his analytical soul. Hell, lead singer Weiland even looks more like Beelzebub than anyone in rock. I myself, for whom STP is the punchline to a cynical joke, have a tough time getting their po-faced grunge simulacra out of my head when I accidentally happen across it – I awoke this morning with “Big Bang Baby,” the first single from the new album, ricocheting hoarsely through my head, and had to slap myself several times to keep from singing its Stones-rip chorus (“It’s a crash crash crash”) aloud in front of passers-by. Call a priest, play a Buzzcocks record, for Kurt’s sake do something to cast this evil from my soul!

But there’s still hope, pilgrims. Based on the evidence of the new disc, it looks like the Dark Prince is starting to reel from the repeated smites of the righteous. The effort involved in trying not to sound like Seattleite satellites has formed audible stress fractures in their already-brittle façade; they’re still not terribly original, so their lifts from other eminences have turned farcical (“Big Bang Baby”‘s bridge channels Lush!), the music is bar-band serviceable but awkward and stiff, the lyrics continue to reach far beyond their grasp in search of profundity (“Quite bored of those inflatable ties,” are you? Me too, buddy, me too), and worst of all, Weiland’s husky croon, their most appealing feature, has been reduced to a ragged rasp. All for the best, really. Yes, Tiny Music is going to shift a few trillion units and produce more singles than there are songs on the album, just like before, and the bulk of rock-crit derision is going to be saved for the fraud-rockers and corporate charlatans who have sprung up in the Pilots’ wake, thereby calling off the manhunt for this fallen Punk Rock Enemy Number One. They will be left to their own shopworn devices and will slowly continue to slide into hip-trivia-question opprobrium. And that’s fine with me, ’cause in writing this, I’ve cast out the unclean spirit at last and no longer need be the long-suffering Job in the rock ‘n’ roll wilderness. Free at last. And only I am escaped to tell thee.