Faith No More

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Faith No More was an influential American rock band that formed in San Francisco, California in 1984 and disbanded in 1998.

Their music combined elements of heavy metal, funk, hardcore punk, progressive, soul, hip hop, and jazz, among many others.

History

Early days

Faith No More formed in 1984 out of the ashes of Faith No Man, a punk rock band formed and headed by Mike Morris in the early 1980s. The band was then called "Sharp Young Men". They wrote a few songs and started performing at clubs. Upon being offered a release by Ministry of Propaganda Records, they changed their name to Faith No Man. The band released a 7" in 1982 containing two tracks: "All Quiet in Heaven/Song of Liberty". After the release, tensions with Wade Worthington resulted in him leaving the band. He was quickly replaced by Billy Gould's roommate, Roddy Bottum. The band lasted only a few more months.

Roddy Bottum, Mike Bordin, and Bill Gould left Faith No Man. They chose the name "Faith No More" at the suggestion of a friend (as "The Man" was no more). After cycling through a few guitarists, the members recruited Jim Martin. A number of singers were tried, including a six-month stint by Courtney Love as confirmed by Mike Bordin in a 1997 interview Love was, and remains, a friend of Bottum's. An airing has since surfaced of her performing on San Francisco Public Access TV with the band during their alleged "New Romantic phase".

Chuck Mosely became the band's full time singer and appeared on their first two records. A well known song from this era is "We Care a Lot", a satire of the prevalence of charity-related rock efforts such as Live Aid and "We Are the World".

During this period, the band gained a reputation for serious infighting and friction. There were frequent rumors of physical confrontations between band members. Indeed, in a short history of the band in one issue, the British music newspaper Melody Maker observed that the band's internal relationships had descended into "pathological hatred". Bordin in particular seemed to be very much the "whipping boy" of the band and the butt of numerous cruel pranks and practical jokes. It is doubtful that the band would have stayed together had they not been successful after their second album, Introduce Yourself.

The Real Thing

Mosely was fired in 1988 and replaced with singer Mike Patton. Patton, who was singing with his high school band Mr. Bungle, was recruited at Martin's suggestion after he heard a demo of Mr. Bungle's long-over death metal days. Patton dropped out of Humboldt State University to join Faith No More and in two weeks had written all the lyrics for the songs that would make up the Grammy award nominated album The Real Thing.

The Real Thing has been described as "early Brian Eno joins Led Zeppelin and Funkadelic." The video for "Epic", which featured slow motion footage of a fish flopping out of water, received extensive airplay on MTV in the summer of 1990, despite provoking anger from animal rights activists. That same year, Faith No More gave memorable performances at the 1990 MTV Video Music Awards (September 6) and on the 293rd episode of Saturday Night Live (December 1). The Real Thing started to chart 1 year after it's initial release. In 1990 the band went on a extensive tour of America, sending both the hit single 'Epic" and the album 'The Real Thing" to platinum status in Canada, USA and South America. The album also had big sales numbers in Australia, UK and the rest of Europe pushing the total sales well above 3.5 million worldwide. Some of the songs on The Real Thing have subsequently been used commercially over the years. The lyrics to "Epic" were featured in the manga graphic novel The Dirty Pair, a Plague of Angels. The Dirty Pair are two female law enforcement officers in a future world who go to a karaoke night and sing Epic. From out of Nowhere features on the EA Sports' Games Madden NFL 2005 and NHL 2005. Additionally, "Falling to Pieces" featured prominently in Ridley Scott's 2001 war movie Black Hawk Down where it is used as background music as the soldiers prepare for their mission. According to the Mark Bowden book upon which the film is based, when the soldiers were preparing for the actual 1993 mission, Guns N' Roses' song "Welcome to the Jungle" was playing on the base's loudspeakers, and some soldiers mused whether this might be an omen; Axl Rose refused to let the song be used in the film, so "Falling to Pieces" was substituted as appropriate to the time period and similarly prophetic. Faith No More toured with Guns N' Roses in support of The Real Thing.

Angel Dust

Faith No More displayed an even more distinctly experimental bent on their next album, Angel Dust. One critic writes that the album is "one of the more complex and simply confounding records ever released by a major label," and another writes that "'A Small Victory', which seems to run Madame Butterfly through Metallica and Nile Rodgers … reveals a developing facility for combining unlikely elements into startlingly original concoctions."

Angel Dust featured the singles "Midlife Crisis," "A Small Victory," and a re-recording of the theme to the film Midnight Cowboy. "Midlife Crisis" has been used in the popular videogames, Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas, playing on fictional alternative station Radio X and in Tony Hawk's Underground 2. Later pressings of the album also included their cover of the Commodores classic "Easy", which in some parts of the world became the band's biggest hit; "Easy" was subsequently used in a commercial for Levi's in 2006. Angel Dust, though not as successful as The Real Thing in the U.S., sold 665.000 copies there, and did manage to outsell The Real Thing in many other world charts. In Germany, for example, the record was certified Gold for sales of more than 250,000 copies. The album also matched the sales of The Real Thing in Canada (Platinum) Australia (Gold) and surpassed it in many countries in Europe like 'Netherlands, France, Russia and the UK. Angel Dust spawned 5 singles + 1 Radio only Promo single, (Midlife Crisis,A Small Victory,Easy,Be Aggressive, Everything's Ruined and Land Of Sunshine). All of these singles charted in UK and Australian Top 100 singles charts with Easy been the most popular of them all.Taking from various charts/sources like Canada, US, UK, Australia, Germany Angel Dust worldwide sales push the 3 million mark.

After touring to support Angel Dust in the summer of 1992, longtime guitarist Jim Martin was fired by fax before the recording of their follow-up, King for a Day... Fool for a Lifetime (or KFAD/FFAL) in 1995. He was replaced by Mr. Bungle guitarist Trey Spruance, who also left soon after; just before the band was to begin their world tour. Spruance was replaced by Dean Menta, the band's guitar roadie.

King for a Day... Fool for a Lifetime

King for a Day... Fool for a Lifetime was an equally experimental album, varying in styles and moods from heavy and slow to spasmodic and jazzy. In the U.S. the album failed to get any sort of attraction or following, slipping out of the charts quickly. Sales were below that of Angel Dust. KFAD..FFAL did manage to go 'Gold' in some countries like 'UK, Australia, New Zealand, Netherlands and Germany, which gave the album a respectable sales figure of around 1.2 million.But this was significantly below of their other albums so the band accordingly decided to cut their world tour short by 4 months, canceled the singles "The Gentle Art of Making Enemies" and "Take This Bottle", and released a 7 x 7-inch box set of singles that included the B-sides and some interviews between the songs.Singles off KFAD...FFAL were "Digging The Grave", "Evidence" & "Ricochet". "I Started a Joke" was also released as a single and that song was added on the album later on.

Album of the Year

Album of the Year was released in 1997 and featured yet another new guitarist, Jon Hudson, who was a former roommate of Billy Gould. The album debuted much higher than expected in some countries, for example in Germany the album debuted at #2 and stayed in the chart for 5 months. In Australia went to #1 and certified "Platinum". In an additional 12 countries in Europe, it went either gold or high in the charts. In the U.S. the reaction was slow for the album; however, just as interest was picking up on their tours and album they called it a day. The singles "Ashes To Ashes" and "Last Cup Of Sorrow" had minimal success. The music video for "Last Cup of Sorrow" is based on the Alfred Hitchcock film Vertigo. Electro-tinged ballad "Stripsearch" was released as a single in various countries (excluding the U.S. and UK). "She Loves Me Not" was canceled as a single which was a little indicator of their imminent break-up. Album Of The Year had a very similar success rate as it's predecessor "KFAD..FFAL" sales wise, struggling to hit 1 million copies worldwide. The singles off the album were "Ashes to Ashes", "Last Cup Of Sorrow" & "Stripsearch".

Faith No More’s end

In early 1998 the new flaring of break-up rumors on the Internet began. Starting with a rumor posted to the Faith No More newsgroup alt.music.faith-no-more claiming Mike Patton had quit the band in favor of side projects, this rumor, although denied at the time, proved to be at least partly true. The band canceled their planned support tour for Aerosmith and on April 19, 1998 Billy Gould began spreading the following by email and fax:

Faith No More played their last show in Lisbon, Portugal on April 7, 1998.

Post-Faith No More

After the dissolution of Faith No More the members have gone on to numerous different projects.

Mike Patton went on to work with long time side-band Mr. Bungle (whom he had been playing with before FNM). Later he worked with producer Dan The Automator on various albums including Lovage: Music to Make Love to Your Old Lady By. Other projects were with John Zorn, Björk, Rahzel, Imani Coppola. He has been active with several other groups, including Tomahawk, Fantômas, Peeping Tom, and The Dillinger Escape Plan. Mike Patton also plays the voice of The Darkness in the video game The Darkness. He also got his own record label Ipecac Records.

Keyboardist Roddy Bottum formed Imperial Teen in 1996.

Jim Martin has made guest appearances including Antipop by Primus, as well as having released a solo album entitled Milk and Blood (1996). He also appeared on Echobrain's self-titled debut album alongside former Metallica bassist Jason Newsted.

Mike Bordin regularly performs as a member of Ozzy Osbourne's band, as well as Black Sabbath and he was also a member of Korn for a tour when their drummer David Silveria had suffered a broken wrist. He played drums on Jerry Cantrell's album Degradation Trip.

Billy Gould was a member of Brujeria, as well as founder of Koolarrow Records, and has also overseen the releases of various Faith No More compilations. He also played a few songs on Fear Factory's 2005 album Transgression. In 1998, Billy Gould produced the album Vainajala (1998) by the Finnish rock band CMX. H He also played With Black Diamond Brigade From Norway. He also toured with the German noise-rock band Harmful throughout Germany, Austria, Slovakia, Czech Republic and the Balkans in 2007. He produced their album 7, available through Koolarrow Records.

Faith No More's "Epic" and "We Care a Lot" are featured in the videogame Rock Band. Gamers can play along with the original master recordings, using guitar, microphone and drum controllers to simulate a virtual rock band in their living room. "We Care Alot" from the Introduce Yourself album has been used most recently as the theme song for the Discovery Channel's Dirty Jobs.

Collaborations

Faith No More collaborated with the Boo-Yaa TRIBE for the song "Another Body Murdered" on the 1993 Judgment Night soundtrack. In 1998, the Sparks album Plagiarism was released featuring two collaborations with Faith No More ("This Town Ain't Big Enough for the Both of Us" and "Something for the Girl with Everything").

Band members

as Faith No Man (1981)	Mike Morris – vocals, guitar Billy Gould – bass Wade Worthington – keyboard Mike Bordin – drums
as Faith No Man (1981–1982)	Mike Morris – vocals, guitar Billy Gould – bass Roddy Bottum – keyboard Mike Bordin – drums
(1982–1983)	Billy Gould – bass Roddy Bottum – keyboard Mike Bordin – drums The guitarist and vocalist changed frequently during this period. They were as follows: Vocalists: Joe Pye Walter Paula Frazer Courtney Love Guitarists: Jake Paula Frazer Mark Stewart Desmond Trial Scott Colbertson Mark Bowen
(1984–1988)	Chuck Mosely – vocals Jim Martin – guitar Billy Gould – bass Roddy Bottum – keyboard Mike Bordin – drums

The “Patton era”

(1988–1993)	Mike Patton – vocals Jim Martin – guitar Billy Gould – bass Roddy Bottum – keyboard Mike Bordin – drums
(1994)	Mike Patton – vocals Billy Gould – bass Roddy Bottum – keyboard Mike Bordin – drums
(1995)	Mike Patton – vocals Trey Spruance – guitar Billy Gould – bass Roddy Bottum – keyboard Mike Bordin – drums
(1995–1996)	Mike Patton – vocals Dean Menta – guitar Billy Gould – bass Roddy Bottum – keyboard Mike Bordin – drums
(1997–1998)	Mike Patton – vocals Jon Hudson – guitar Billy Gould – bass Roddy Bottum – keyboard Mike Bordin – drums

Discography

Studio albums Tribute compilations Live albums Compilations

Bibliography

The Real Story	—	Biography about Faith No More
The Real Thing	}	Tablature books, available in both guitar and bass format
Angel Dust
King for a Day... Fool for a Lifetime

Footnotes

External links

• FNM.com – home to FAQ, band history

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Last updated on Thursday March 13, 2008 at 20:23:22 PDT (GMT -0700)
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