Mondo Generator

A Drug Problem That Never Existed (Ipecac)
by Brian Varney

…Wherein Nick Oliveri’s meth-riddled, screeching 13-year old Queens of the Stone Age persona is given an album’s worth of space in which to jump around and break stuff. Kinda strange that this would happen, since Oliveri’s temper tantrums are damn-near every QOTSA’s least-favorite part of what that band does, but someone out there obviously cares, since this is actually the second Mondo Generator album to see the light of day. Anyhoo, this definitely feels like a side project since it’s all over the map stylistically: There’s the faux-metal of opener “Meth, I Hear You Callin'” (which sounds exactly like you’d expect a metal tune done by a member of QOTSA to sound, i.e. snotty and condescending), the singer-songwritery “All I Can Do” (acoustic guitars and harmony vox and everything!), the old-school punk rock of “Jr. High Love,” plus a handful of the short blasts of screech that I always skip when I play the QOTSA albums (“Me and You,” “Here We Come,” “F.Y.I’m Free”). The proceedings are given a lift when Mark Lanegan pops up for a guest vocal on closer “Four Corners,” but by then it’s too late to salvage the album and you’re already mad because you’ll never get back the 38 minutes you just spent listening to this thing.
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