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Jun 3, 2016Yet, with all these contrasting angles and despite the roadhouse crew bringing up the lower end, the album flies by breezily. Although the band has legion of dispatched formers bassists in their wake, it appears the band does play well with others. And not only that, they know how to use “others“ to great potential.
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Jun 20, 2016A Melvins selection box of sorts, Basses Loaded is packed with delights.
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Jun 6, 2016Basses Loaded is excellent. Like every other Melvins record it holds its own identity while oozing the same sweet black guitar sludge they have re-perfected many times over the years.
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Q MagazineJun 2, 2016Catching the eye more than the ear, the rickety Maybe I Am Amused features Nirvana's Krist Novoselic. Meatier stuff surfaces on the quintessentially sludgy War Pussy, while I Want To Tell You thrillingly imagines Osborne's heroes, Kiss, covering The Beatles in hypermelodic proto-psych mode. [Jul 2016, p.111]
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Jul 29, 2016The best bits are when the band’s own drummer Dale Crover picks up the bass for a third of the album’s 12 tracks.
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Jun 27, 2016Basses Loaded is something of a mixed bag. Some of it works, some of it doesn’t and some of it is just a little bit too silly for its own good. As usual though, the good far out-weighs the bad, and the Pinkus and McDonald and Warren contributions make it worth a look.
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Jun 7, 2016There’s much that rocks here, and rocks deep on this four-string feast with multiple dishes.
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UncutJun 2, 2016It's much less obstreperous than most of their earlier works. [Jul 2016, p.76]
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Jun 2, 2016Undoubtedly solid, diverse and finding well good use of its plethora of bass players and its loveable, nutty front man, Melvins deliver yet another solid release.
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Jun 16, 2016A good, if standard, Melvins album.
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Jun 3, 2016The Melvins are prolific without taking heed of their stature or prominence, and Basses Loaded is a testament to their nonchalant and fiercely inventive place in the world of loud and angry music.
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MagnetAug 2, 2016It's a bit mad, but what else would you expect from the Melvins, which in-and-of -itself is a shame. [No. 132, p.55]
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Jun 15, 2016Rather than making a sharp left turn on Basses Loaded, the band instead pays homage to their long, curious history by plugging in with some longtime cohorts, making an unholy ruckus, and once again not giving a damn about what we think of it.
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Jun 3, 2016It flits from doomy death marches to frenetic, fuzzy psych rock freakouts like the fantastic ‘Choco Plumbing’, while indulging in some quirkier elements including a stomping cover of The Beatles ‘I Want To Tell You’ and a sweet, Casio keyboard run-through of American standard ‘Take Me Out to the Ballgame’.
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Jun 2, 2016Most of the time, Basses Loaded is more interesting in concept than it is satisfying in execution, though the best moments suggest that future full-length collaborations with McDonald or Dunn would be worth exploring.
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Jun 6, 2016With its variations in mood, tone, and personnel, Basses Loaded plays more like compilation of B-sides culled from multiple recording sessions spanning several years.
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The WireJul 18, 2016The line-up sounds tantalisingly promising--but the hoped for bass-heavy meltdown never fully materialises. [Jun 2016, p.58]
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Jul 5, 2016Basses Loaded is an intriguing study into the influence of different bass players on a legendary band's sonic dynamics, and offers isolated moments of creative triumph--but it's a record overwhelmed by its creators back catalogue, and not one you could imagine having any kind of longevity.