Obtain This!

Album: Obtainium
Artist: Skeleton Key
Genre: Experimental Rock
Year: 2002
Label: Ipecac

Eric Sanko, former bass player for the Lounge Lizards, leads the bizarre and eccentric Skeleton Key. Equal parts Primus, Tom Waits and Einsturzende Neubauten, Skeleton Key sounds like a junk yard crew would if they formed a band. The appeal of the group is its unique sound, which they achieve by way of ancient microphones, old guitars and junky percussion. The sound is actually fairly funky, all things considered. Sanko has been doing the music thing for a long time and knows how to play his instrument. The whole band is skilled and you’d have to be to follow Sanko’s eccentricities to the letter. The guitar sounds like it comes from archaic speakers and during some of the more blistering solos has a tendency to cut in and out, but it works to add to the atmosphere of the music.

The percussion is the real draw though. The drum set sounded like it was cobbled together from scrap metal and it probably was. Junky and cacophonous, it batters its way around the stage, knocking into absolutely everything. To see the band live must be something. Individual standouts are tracks like “Barker of The Dupes” which is probably the bands most junkyard driven track. Scratch that, this is the sound of the junkyard coming to life and attacking the nearest town within the vicinity. Sanko’s lyrics are also fun, especially on the Track “One Way, My Way” where he describes a man with a voice like a sheet of lead and tongue out of which grows a fist.

More standouts include “Kerosene” and “Roost in Peace” as they both demonstrate the bands junk sound to great effect. There is some weakness to the album, though. I would have liked to see more trash percussion here and there, and the tracks “King Know It All” and “That Tongue” could have been skipped all together. Another problem is that there hasn’t been a new Skeleton Key album in roughly six years now. Eric Sanko created something great and could still make something greater. But where is he? Who knows? Maybe King Know It All knows…