Mike Patton's "pop" project
Peeping Tom kept fans waiting for a really, really long time. Consequently, the four years between its inception around 2002 and fruition in 2006 were a gestation period for urban-legendary speculation about the release to flood the public consciousness. Was he really working with
Norah Jones? What did he mean by "radio-friendly pop record"? Given the thrashing, acidic nature of
Patton's other projects like
Mr. Bungle,
Faith No More, and
Tomahawk, nobody expected this album to be "Mike Patton Sings the Top 40," and most fans figured the notoriously enigmatic musician was just doing what we pay him to do: messing with us. But
Peeping Tom actually does make a pretty good case for itself as pop music. The band might be better characterized as an alt-hip-hop project, but in the end, it's a
Mike Patton creation -- it resists categorization. On "Mojo," the album's first single, gangsta-style squealing synths and reverb bass push ahead while
Patton embraces a slicker and smoother take on his trademark blend of clean vibrato, nasally tension, and belting clarity. This is not any kind of rock-rap that's been heard before; it bears no likeness to
Limp Bizkit or even
Faith No More. This track is also as good a place as any to discuss the open mockery that pervades the record, deriding the very style it embraces through moments where it cartoonishly veers into musical caricature, or drops in lyrical references to known R&B-style pop songs. When
Patton sings "Roll it up and smoke it again/Bottoms up and drink it again/Fix it up and shoot it again/I can't believe I did it again," he is keenly aware of how it sounds for such an avant-garde songwriter as himself to recite such perfect rock & roll clichés. Circumventing any possible debate on this topic,
Patton literally quotes
Britney Spears' "Oops, I Did It Again" as a postscript on the track.