Frances the Mute

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Frances the Mute
Studio album by The Mars Volta
Released	March 1, 2005
Recorded	July–October 2004 at Avatar Studios, New York
Genre	Progressive rock, Experimental rock, Jazz fusion
Length	76:57 (CD edition) 77:19 (triple vinyl edition)
Label	Gold Standard Laboratories, Universal, Strummer
Producer	Omar Rodriguez-Lopez
Professional reviews
AbsolutePunk (96%) link Allmusic link The Aquarian (A) link Delusions of Adequacy (A-) link Drowned in Sound link E! Online (A-) link Kerrang! Paste Magazine link Playlouder link PopMatters link Punknews.org link Rock Sound Rolling Stone link Stylus Magazine (A-) link NME link
The Mars Volta chronology
Live (2003) Frances the Mute (2005) Scabdates (2005)
Singles from Frances the Mute
"The Widow" Released: March 14, 2005 "L'Via L'Viaquez" Released: July 11, 2005

Frances the Mute is the second studio album by progressive rock band The Mars Volta released in the US on March 1, 2005. The album's lyrics often jump from Spanish to English. Though not as commercially successful as De-loused in the Comatorium, it received considerable critical praise. The album displays a deep jazz influence while infusing Latin flavor into many songs while utilising many of the Dub, Ambient and Electronica influences and techniques experimented with in De Facto and Omar Rodriguez-Lopez's solo project in order to create one cohesive composition divided into many tracks. Originally to be titled Sarcophagus^[1], Frances the Mute sold 123,000 copies in its opening week and has sold 465,000 copies as of September 2006. The album made multiple "Best of" lists at the end of 2005.^[2] In the Q & Mojo Classic Special Edition Pink Floyd & The Story of Prog Rock, the album came #18 in its list of "40 Cosmic Rock Albums". ^[3]

History

Jeremy Ward, audio artist for The Mars Volta until his death, had previously worked as a repo man. One day, Ward discovered a diary in the backseat of a car he was repossessing, and began to note the similarities between his life and that of the author — most notably, that they had both been adopted. The diary told of the author's search for his biological parents, with the way being pointed by a collection of people, their names being the basis for each named track of Frances the Mute. Ward was in the process of completing it at the time of his death.

Omar Rodriguez-Lopez wrote all the music for Frances The Mute, some of which was inspired by jams performed by the group on tour for De-Loused In The Comatorium, such as a jam frequently used in "Drunkship Of Lanterns" that evolved into the breakdown in "Cygnus....Vismund Cygnus." Rodriguez-Lopez also arranged and produced the recording sessions himself.

In December 2004, a full copy of Frances the Mute was leaked to the Internet from the vinyl version. The rip was of poor quality. Encoded as a 96 kbit/s MP3, other versions were reencoded to 192 kbit/s WMA from the source mp3, resulting in even worse audio quality. Gold Standard Laboratories issued a statement decrying the Internet release for its subpar sound quality, and suggesting that fans should respect the band's request not to share the leaked music.

The first single, "The Widow", was released in early 2005 and the album Frances the Mute was released on midnight, March 1, 2005, and sold over 100,000 copies within the first week of release, and debuted at number four on the Billboard Album Charts. The title track, "Frances the Mute", which is purportedly meant to be track one on the album and, according to the band, "decodes" the album's story, was not included in the album, and was released on March 14, 2005, in the United Kingdom. This release was a three set limited edition, containing a single with a live version of "The Widow", played at The Wiltern in Los Angeles on June 13, and the unreleased title song "Frances the Mute." Also in the collection is a DVD that includes clips from their performance at the Electric Ballroom in London on July 9, 2003, "The Widow" music video, and the "Televators" music video. Finally, the last item was a 12" single pressed on marble green vinyl^[4] including "Frances The Mute" and a live version of "The Widow", released by Gold Standard Labs. Only approximately 10,000 were pressed.

A second single from the album, "L'Via L'Viaquez" was released in June 2005. Included on this single there was another unreleased song entitled "The Bible and the Breathalyzer".

Frances The Mute debuted at No. 4 on The Billboard 200 and has sold nearly 465,000 copies in the United States, according to Nielsen SoundScan. The album was the band's career best at No. 4 until their fourth album The Bedlam in Goliath came out almost 3 years later on the Billboard 200 at No. 3. The album was certified gold by the RIAA in the US for shipments of 500,000 albums on October 5, 2009.

In 2008, the edited version of "L'Via L'Viaquez" was featured on the video game Guitar Hero: World Tour.^[5]

Sound

Frances the Mute is comparable to The Mars Volta's 2003 release De-Loused in the Comatorium, with its cryptic, verbose lyrics, and highly layered instrumentals, although the progressive rock influence is stronger on Frances the Mute than it was on De-Loused in the Comatorium. The band's musical influences are more prominent; the guitar solo on "The Widow" seems inspired by classic rock, and much of the album has a psychedelic feel to it. Perhaps because of inspiration from such Pink Floyd albums as Meddle, ambient noise plays a larger role on Frances the Mute than it does on De-Loused in the Comatorium. "Miranda That Ghost Just Isn't Holy Anymore", for example, begins with 4 minutes of coquí frogs singing while a thick soundscape is slowly built from Cedric Bixler-Zavala's voice and synthesizers.

Track listing

The finalized track listing had five tracks and was intended to be released as such on all formats; the vinyl version and online retailer copies (such as those from the iTunes Store) can be found with this track listing. Because of disputes with Universal Records, "Cassandra Gemini" (listed as "Cassandra Geminni" on most versions of the album) ⁵ was arbitrarily split into eight tracks on the CD version, taking up tracks 5 through 12, since the band would otherwise only be paid an EP's wages for a 5 track album. The splits in the eight CD tracks (5 through 12) do not represent the five listed movements of the song, although the entirety of Sarcophagi is within the track 12.

On vinyl, "Cassandra Gemini" was split among two sides, in the middle of "Faminepulse". Each side of vinyl (save the final one) ends with a locked groove, repeating either a sound effect or a bar of music endlessly until the needle is lifted. The third side, containing "Miranda That Ghost Just Isn't Holy Anymore", opens by repeating the 30 seconds of coquí noises that conclude "L'Via L'Viaquez"; this small portion is indexed separately from "Miranda". A limited edition 4LP version also contained the Widow single as the fourth vinyl; all four discs were printed on glow-in-the-dark vinyl and were packaged in a red plastic case.^[6]

Original track listing

CD pressing

Japanese bonus DVD

Best Buy Exclusive

The Best Buy version of the album included a download card for one bonus track:

Vinyl pressing

Side one

Side two

Side three

Side four

Side five

Personnel

• Omar Rodriguez-Lopez – guitar, producer
• Cedric Bixler-Zavala – vocals
• Jon Theodore – drums
• Isaiah Ikey Owens – keyboards
• Juan Alderete de la Peña – bass
• Marcel Rodriguez-Lopez – percussion
• Flea – trumpet on "The Widow" and "Miranda, That Ghost Just Isn't Holy Anymore"
• John Frusciante – first two guitar solos on "L'Via L'Viaquez"
• Larry Harlow – piano, treated clavinet on "L'Via L'Viaquez" and "Cassandra Gemini"
• Lenny Castro – added percussion (all tracks)
• Adrián Terrazas-González – tenor sax, flute on "Cassandra Gemini"
• Salvador (Chava) Hernandez – trumpet
• Wayne Bergeron – trumpet
• Randy Jones – tuba
• Roger Manning – piano
• Nicholas Lane – trombone
• William Reichenbach – bass trombone
• David Campbell – string arrangements
• Larry Corbett – cello
• Suzie Katayama – cello
• Violins:
  • Fernano Moreno
  • Erick Hernandez
  • Diego Casillas
  • Ernesto Molina
  • Joel Derouin
  • Roberto Cani
  • Mario De Leon
  • Peter Kent
  • Josefina Vergara
• The Coquí of Puerto Rico
• Storm Thorgerson - cover design

Singles

• "The Widow" (2005)
• "L'Via L'Viaquez" (2005)

Charts

Album

Singles

Notes

¹ Latin for "Swan"; it is also a constellation.

² Latin for "The easy descent into Hell".

³ "L'Via L'Viaquez" was misprinted as "L' Via L' Viaquez" on the back and in the liner notes of Frances the Mute.

⁴ Latin for "Go With Me". A Vade Mecum is also a handbook or something always carried on a person.

⁵ The official spelling for the song title is "Cassandra Gemini"; despite the typo "Geminni" printed on all parts of the CD packaging, the MusicBrainz database, the vinyl release of the album, and the band's official site all list the track as "Gemini".

References