While they differed in style and scope, this band’s signature works- Melody of Certain Damaged Lemons, Misery Is a Butterfly, and 23-were united by a policy of swift and total immersion: Each led with a striking opening track that immediately thrust you into the album’s distinct three-dimensional sound, making it feel like you’ve been dropped into a film already in progress. Arriving nine years on from their last full-length release, Sit Down for Dinner is the life-saving dose of CPR that gets this band’s oxygen flowing and blood pumping again. Once the pandemic took hold, you could be forgiven for wondering if the band would still be standing on the other side of it. In 2019, Makino released her first solo album, by which point Blonde Redhead had all but ground to a halt. But that sort of frisson was in short supply on 2010’s Penny Sparkle and 2014’s Barragán, records that resembled mood boards of disparate sounds in search of songs, with little of the dramatic flair that powered the band’s previous transformations. In the stellar seven-album run from 1995’s serrated self-titled debut to 2007’s shimmering shoegaze odyssey 23, Blonde Redhead had successfully pivoted from no-wave noisemakers to arthouse-indie auteurs, all while sustaining a highwire balance of melodic whimsy and needling tension. She was very desperate and she did something that I know she regrets.There was a certain cruel irony in the fact a song that began as a time-killing lark-recorded by singer Kazu Makino while her twin-brother accomplices Amedeo and Simone Pace were sleeping at the studio-would become the defining work of a group that’s otherwise taken such a methodical approach to their craft. She was in love with my Dad, and my Dad was not faithful to her, and it broke her heart. Some people think, never take your life, and some people find that their life isn't worth living. Life wasn't worth it for her, that was her opinion. 'There's a part - 'Cash in now honey, cash in Miss Smith.' Miss Smith is my Mother our last name was Smith. For me, I wanted to experience the heights, and the lows come along with it.' 'What it feels to descend from the mountain top. Climbing this mountain and getting as high as you can, and then coming down that mountain,' reveals Farrell. The version on Nothing's Shocking was re-recorded in 1988. Mountain song was first recorded in 1986 and appeared on the soundtrack to the film Dudes starring Jon Cryer. Jane's Addiction vocalist Perry Farrell gives Adam Reader some heartfelt insight into Jane’s Addiction's hard rock manifesto 'Mountain Song', which was the second single from their revolutionary album Nothing's Shocking. The hurt makes you different (You'll be a freak), but in the end you're not alone because she is like you - and she'll always be there (And I'll keep you company). She tells him that things won't get better by themselves (Don't cross your finger/Sundays will never change), the world and the bullies will always be out there (They keep on coming). But she knows it's hard but can help you when it feels too continue (Signal if you can't/Say, 'no more'). But she says you can bring yourself out by taking your life back (Don't be a fool, make it easier/You'll learn to say when).

She says I see you are hurting because she was there too (Say you were me/Then you could see the view/You'll know we are equally damaged). She tells him to take things slowly (Find your name/Do it all the same equally) and to ask for help when it's too much (Signal when you can't breathe no more). Perhaps it's a loss, or bullying, or depression but the singer sees how it has broken him and it's familiar (Guess we're equally damaged). The song is about reaching out to someone who has been suffering deeply by themselves (Maybe again/he will be alone)and to help them come out of the darkness.

For the Damaged Coda Blonde Redhead