Extreme Pornograffitti

III Sides to Every Story was an overambitious project and an often times pretentious album, I think Extreme succeeds here anyway. This album is just as strong and adventurous as Pornograffitti. Extreme successfully mixes hard rock and heavy metal with funk, pop and prog. Extreme has always had progressive tendencies in their music, even though most do not consider Extreme to be progressive. Prog is about musical innovation, not technical masturbation. And Extreme was certainly innovative. Hell, even those of you who have been misled into thinking that progressive bands need be technical, try and find a guitarist more technical than Bettencourt.

Extreme's music was never easy to classify, since it rarely confined itself to heavy metal, hard rock, or pop. The Massachusetts-based band formed in 1985; guitarist Nuno Bettencourt had already played in a local band with bassist Pat Badger, while singer Gary Cherone fronted his own group with drummer Paul Geary. The two bands eventually merged, and Cherone and Bettencourt formed a songwriting partnership that would soon place Extreme atop the Billboard charts, if only for a short period…

To some listeners, An Accidental Collocation of Atoms? may not seem necessary, since Extreme's two hits were already on one album, yet for casual fans who don't have Pornograffitti, or want highlights from the other records, this is a strong, representative collection. Sure, dedicated fans will find some favorites missing – after all, these are pulled from records that were designed as albums – but all the singles are here, including such European releases as "Get the Funk Out" and "Tragic Comic," along with such strong album tracks as "Decadence Dance." There's only one semi-rarity to snag the faithful – the "Horn Mix" of "Cupid's Dead" – but these fans are likely to stick with the original albums, no matter what. And, truth be told, there's some relevance in that, since the albums were cohesive works, but An Accidental Collision of Atoms remains a first-rate sampler that proves Extreme were better than the vast majority of their Bush-era hard-rock and pop-metal peers.

Extreme - III Sides To Every Story
EAC+LOG+CUE | FLAC: 510 MB | Full Artwork: 45 MB | 5% Recovery Info
Label/Cat#: A&M # 31454 0124 2 | Country/Year: US 1992
Genre: Rock | Style: Funk Metal, Hard Rock, Glam

"Extreme's brand of hard rock balanced ambitious, progressive tendencies with catchy melodies owing more to the Beatles than anthemic arena rock; on III Sides to Every Story, the former tends to dominate. (…)there are some fine songs to be found: "Rest in Peace" displays both Bettencourt's technique and melodicism as a soloist, while "Seven Sundays" continues in their occasional lounge ballad vein, and "Tragic Comic" and "Stop the World" are two more intelligent, wounded-romantic pop gems." ~AMG