It’s been a good year for white boys with acoustic guitars — most notably Staind, the Massachusetts basement rockers who became a household name with the worldwide smash "It’s Been Awhile." LA mood-metal freaks Incubus also hit the pop charts with "Drive," a less doleful strum-and-hum about grabbing life by the steering wheel. "Whatever tomorrow brings, I’ll be there/With open arms and open eyes," sang frontman Brandon Boyd in a voice that was destined to move beyond the confinement of the rock arena. With its easygoing hip-hop beat and earnest self-help lyrics, "Drive" was a crucial antidote to the chronic depression of "It’s Been Awhile."
It’s weird to discuss either of those songs in the past tense, since both continue to dominate radio playlists across the dial. But Incubus are moving forward with the release of "Wish You Were Here," the follow-up to "Drive" and the first single from their third major-label full-length, Morning View (Epic). If "Drive" was an epiphany, "Wish You Were Here" is downright euphoric: Boyd is lying on the beach, singing a postcard to a friend as he loses himself in the sand, the sky, and the ocean. A wave of rock guitar comes crashing in on the chorus, sweeping away the verse’s cool psychedelia. The album cover adds to the mood: it’s an idyllic shot of a peaceful ocean at sunrise that actually looks like a postcard from Southern California.
None of which would suggest anything about the band’s impressive rage-rock pedigree to casual pop fans — unless, perhaps, they looked up the word incubus in the dictionary ("an evil spirit believed to descend upon and have sexual intercourse with women as they sleep"). But Incubus have been hanging around the fringes of Korn nation since at least ’97, when they released both their debut EP, Enjoy Incubus, and an ensuing LP, S.C.I.E.N.C.E., on Epic. Back then, they were considered a cheap 311 knockoff with a singer who did a decent impersonation of former Faith No More frontman Mike Patton — not the most auspicious way to begin a career in rock.
S.C.I.E.N.C.E. went nowhere, but the band did land buzz-building slots on both OzzFest and the Family Values Tour in ’98. They returned the following year with Make Yourself (Epic), which toned down their hippie-funk tendencies in favor of shimmery pop metal and began to set them apart from the pack. "A decade ago/I never thought I would be/At 23/On the verge of spontaneous combustion/Woe is me," was Boyd’s æsthetic-defining opening line on the disc’s first single, "Pardon Me." On the same radio stations at about the same time, Blink-182 were also falling apart at the tender age of 23, but Incubus sounded more desperate. These guys weren’t just prank-calling some girl’s mom because they got dumped — they’d had enough of the world and were about to burst into flames.
The band’s next pop-metal move, "Stellar," was a sappy love song with a soaring, near-emo chorus to match "Pardon Me." Make Yourself was the first album they made with famous R.E.M. producer Scott Litt, who had not previously been associated with metal in any form (unless you count the mosh part of Juliana Hatfield’s "My Sister"). The disc’s pop leanings were no accident, and Boyd’s improved ability to wrap his Patton-style yelp around a decent melody was the key to the band’s progress. Still, the Top 40 success of "Drive" was something few rock fans would have imagined.
As much as veterans of OzzFest and the Family Values Tour aren’t supposed to cross over to the Britney Spears demographic, they’re really not supposed to reach out to the collegiate hip-hop/underground dance crowd, either — but that’s exactly what Incubus did when they went out with Moby’s inaugural Area:One festival this past summer, on a bill with OutKast and Paul Oakenfold. A few years ago, the band’s crunchy jazzbo side would have made them better suited to the now-defunct HORDE tour, but the Area:One thing kinda makes sense too. Their in-house turntablist, DJ Kilmore, goes for low-key ambiance over flashy scratch moves, and the verses of "Pardon Me" incorporate the feel of drum ’n’ bass about as well as any rock act has to date.
That brings us to Morning View, the first Incubus release to carry the weight of high commercial and artistic expectations. Like Radiohead, the band have overcome both the creative failures and the stylistic pigeonholing that dogged them at the beginning of their career. "Drive" established the Incubus brand name the way "Creep" did for Radiohead, but the epic sprawl of Make Yourself endeared the band to the important sector of the rock community that demands big statements, not just a few catchy songs. And Incubus appeal to such a wide range of pop fans that calling their approach eclectic seems an understatement. What other band would think to combine rage rock, jam-happy funk, Top 40 balladry, and hipster electronica?
Incubus start off Morning View in "Pardon Me" mode, fluctuating between quiet, jittery verses and a stomping rock chorus on the opening "Nice To Know You." Boyd is in his usual free-floating state of euphoria, dropping lines about Sarah Michelle Gellar and Jacques Cousteau as he launches into outer space. "Circles" settles into a poppier version of your basic Rage Against the Machine funk-metal groove, as if to reassure long-time fans that the band aren’t quite ready to take up pretty acoustic pop full-time. The song also finds Boyd frustrated with toeing the peace/love line — this time, he reacts to pain and misfortune by invoking karma on his enemies.
But for all their genre-bending inventiveness, Incubus too often fail to hit the mark when it’s time to rock. They have the same problem that’s afflicted their peers — from Korn and Limp Bizkit on down — at one time or another: a ridiculously fussy, funk-obsessed rhythm section. Drummer Jose Pasillas is the prime offender, tossing off fancy fusion licks at every opportunity and refusing to let a song go by without hitting some kind of splash cymbal. Busy finger-style bass lines and the constant hum of turntables don’t help the rock cause either. The band’s well-honed musicianship may be the key to their adventurous approach, but it tends to get in the way when they bring the ruckus.
So it makes sense that the album’s most interesting tune, "Just a Phase," is a dark, mellow waltz that doesn’t blow its stack till the end. As he does throughout, guitarist Michael Einziger looks outside the rock world for inspiration, picking clean, jazz-influenced lines that would’ve fit nicely on the latest Dave Matthews Band album. He doesn’t rock as hard as, say, recently deposed Limp Bizkit ax man Wes Borland, preferring Chili Pepper crunch to all-out metal on heavier tunes like "Warning" and "Blood on the Ground." Boyd brings his aggro touch to the latter, offering up a sensitive guy’s version of the standard new-metal fight song: "I bite my mouth every time you come around/’Cause blood in my mouth beats blood on the ground."
Occasional fits of anger aside, Boyd is a sweet-voiced softie along the lines of Eddie Vedder, and he’s just as given to exploring his feminine side. He comes alive staring into his honey’s eyes on "Echo," a toned-down version of "Stellar" with a neat little brushes-on-the-snare drum ’n’ bass reference. Opening with a Pearl Jam–approved Neil Young guitar lick, "11 a.m." finds Boyd too distraught over a busted love affair to get out of bed. And he emits his deepest Vedder groan on "Mexico," a dark, accusatory lament stripped down to just voice and acoustic guitar.
So there’s enough here to please fans of all of Incubus’s multiple personalities — Morning View is a serious, cohesive rock album with a couple of pretty love songs, plenty of cool, avant-leaning soundscapes from DJ Kilmore, and a few old-school funk percussion breaks thrown in for good measure. It’s also one of the most feel-good discs to emerge from the land of rage rock — maybe a little too feel-good. "It’s so much better/When everyone is in/Are you in?" repeats Boyd ad nauseam over a happy funk groove on the frathouse bong filler "Are You In (V1 VX+)."
The closing "Aqueous Transmission" is even stonier: some weird exotic banjo thing (reportedly lent to the band by hippie-metal guitar spazz Steve Vai) plays a repetitive Eastern theme for eight minutes while flutes and a string section fade in and out of the background. It’s a horrid new-age move that can barely be excused as an end-of-the-album indulgence, but it’s also the kind of eccentricity Incubus pride themselves on. One thing’s for sure: unlike plenty of other tunes on Morning View, "Aqueous Transmission" won’t be getting transmitted on the radio — metal, Top 40, whatever — anytime soon.
