Deep Album Cuts Vol. 283: Jane's Addiction
Jane's Addiction are on tour with Smashing Pumpkins right now, and founding bassist Eric Avery is back in the band for the first time in over a decade, so I thought I'd look back at their catalog.
Jane's Addiction deep album cuts (Spotify playlist):
1. Whores (live)
2. I Would For You (live)
3. Pigs In Zen
4. Summertime Rolls
5. Ted, Just Admit It...
6. Up The Beach
7. Ain't No Right
8. No One's Leaving
9. Then She Did
10. Obvious
11. Kettle Whistle
12. Slow Divers (live)
13. The Riches
14. Superhero
15. I'll Hit You Back
16. Broken People
Tracks 1 and 2 from Jane's Addiction (1987)
Tracks 3, 4, 5 and 6 from Nothing's Shocking (1988)
Tracks 7, 8, 9 and 10 from Ritual de lo Habitual (1990)
Tracks 11 and 12 from Kettle Whistle (1997)
Tracks 13 and 14 from Strays (2003)
Tracks 15 and 16 from The Great Escape Artist (2011)
Jane's Addiction are one of those bands that broke up at the height of their popularity. And even though they've gotten back together many times since then, there's always a "what if" feeling lingering over them, especially since their farewell tour launched the era-defining alt-rock package tour Lollapalooza. Though their indie debut as, unusually, a live album featuring many songs that were never released in studio form, the two proper albums from the band's original run are both absolute monsters, especially Nothing's Shocking.
I feel like the band were a little before my time, because by the time I was really paying attention, they were mainly known for "Been Caught Stealing," which is a fun but sometimes grating song. But once I started to hear other tracks like "Mountain Song," I understood how much they ruled. My friend Mat Leffler-Schulman, a few years my elder, was such a huge fan as a teenager that he had a Jane's Addiction fan site, back when fan sites were kind of a new thing.
Jane's Addiction initially split into two factions. Perry Farrell and Stephen Perkins formed Porno For Pyros, which had a couple of moderately successful albums. And Dave Navarro and Eric Avery formed the trio Deconstruction, which released one self-titled album in 1994 that's completely out of print and off streaming services. But it's on YouTube and it's really worth checking out, the vocals feel like an afterthought but musically it's killer, easy to imagine Jane's making a masterpiece out of some of those ideas if they'd stuck together.
Eric Avery has abstained from the majority of the Jane's Addiction reunions, prior to the current tour he'd only rejoined for tours from 2008 to 2010. And I feel like he's become a figure like Matt Sharp from Weezer where a certain number fans feel like it's not truly the band unless he's involved. After Navarro's brief run with Red Hot Chili Peppers, Flea played bass in the first Jane's Addiction 'relapse' tour in 1997 and some of the new recordings on Kettle Whistle, a collection of rarities and live tracks. The most famous post-reunion Jane's Addiction song is "Superhero," the theme song for "Entourage," which is a song I find incredibly irritating now. But those last couple albums have their moments, particularly The Great Escape Artist, which had songs co-written by Guns N' Roses bassist Duff McKagan and TV On The Radio's David Sitek and feels like a bit of a creative step forward into new territory.
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