King's X Dogman Lyrics

Living Colour gets all the press, but King's X is actually a far more interesting blend of funk and hard rock. Imagine a power trio composed of Bootsy Collins, Leslie West and Ginger Baker, and you get some idea of the cartoonish but exuberant heavy metal funk served up by King's X on its fifth album, "Dogman." Producer Brendan O'Brien (Pearl Jam, Stone Temple Pilots) has captured the trio's vigorously syncopated rhythms, metallic clash and hooky vocal harmonies with an old-fashioned live feel. The lyrics are comicbook nonsense; the chord changes are pedestrian, and nothing is as memorable as the band's 1990 hit, "It's Love," but "Dogman" reminds you how much raucous fun hard rock used to be before it calcified into a dour, plodding exercise in self-importance. Doug Pinnock's bass puts the boogie back into heavy metal, and guitarist Ty Tabor has finally learned to play rhythmically as well as squealingly.

A far more interesting singer than Corey Glover or James Hetfield, Pinnock proves you can still carry a tune when screaming like Robert Plant. When the three voices soar sweetly above the sonic assault on songs as catchy as "Fool You," "Don't Care" or "Complain," the effect is hard to resist. They close out the album with a manic live version of Jimi Hendrix's "Manic Depression." --Geoffrey Himes