LAST CUP OF SORROW 18
On this day in 1997 Faith No More released 'Last Cup Of Sorrow' as the second single from 'Album Of The Year'
Bill Gould | Kerrang! | 1998
"This came from me a little bit... I would say it's a little more dub like, the bass line was very dub-ish. I think I heard something like this - just a very heavy, slow song, probably like a cross between some old dub records and something like Basement Five and a band like Chrome. They were an old San Francisco band, kind of like punk that was very heavy metal, but dark and foreboding... very cinematic. Ifs depressing, but beautiful at the same time. As an album, it was our death record and it was something to feel, something we were going through. The words are from Patton, but I think we were all on the same page with this one."
The Video
Billboard | June 1998 | Gina Van Der Vliet
Faith No More's New Vid To Give Viewers Vertigo
LOS ANGELES—As a homage to Alfred Hitchcock, Faith No More's new video "Last Cup Of Sorrow"
shows the band in a parody of the legendary director's 1958 movie
"Vertigo." "I always thought 'Vertigo' had an interesting music
video feel to it because of the [rich Graphics] in the film," says GMS
director Joseph Kahn. "Also the of idea of FNM's Mike Patton playing Jimmy
Stewart seemed funny to me. Basically you're taking this really subversive
person and putting him in this clean, sterile, technicolor 50s world, yet pieces of the subversiveness of his persona keep coming through this
world. It's like blending an old film with this totally weird 90s type of
guy."
One of the moments Kahn is hinting at is a scene showing
Patton hiding a porno magazine from actress Jennifer Jason Leigh, who plays the dual roles originally portrayed
by Kim Novak. As in the movie. Patton rescues Leigh's character from drowning
and brings her back to his apartment.
Leigh's second character is not as clean cut as in Hitchcock
movie. After the blond character supposedly falls to her death, the actress returns as a sado masochist call girl in a black wig who attacks Patton's character. Ironically, she uses
as a weapon the same stool that Patton was unable to stand on earlier in the
video due to his fear of heights.
"That's the type of subversive stuff I liked doing, without disrespecting the film," Kahn
explains. "But personally I think Hitchcock would have liked the sense of
humour."
Like the movie, which was recently re-released in U.S.
theatres, the video was shot in San Francisco—Faith No More's home town—often at many of the same original locations used for
the film. For example, the Supper Club. formerly known as Ernie's, was
the restaurant that Hitchcock was originally trying to depict in his film. The
filmed movie scenes however, were shot on a movie set built to look like the
restaurant. To create an authentic touch, Kahn, Leigh, and the band managed to
shoot the scene inside the actual restaurant, which had just reopened it's
doors.
Throughout the video, the band members—Patton, vocals; Billy
Gould, bass; Roddy Bottum, keyboards; Mike Bordin, drums; and John Hudson,
guitars—are shown in cameo roles assigned by Kahn.
"At first I was kind of bummed because I [was asked to portray] the lady in the painting, which I didn't really wanna do,"
Gould says with a laugh. "But it all worked out good."
According to Gould, picking a video treatment is often a tedious process
for the band, since there are seldom treatments the members can collectively get enthusiastic
about "We Usually pick the one that's the least bad," Gould says. "But in this case (the
idea) sounded pretty good. And when we got to the shoot and met Joseph we knew
it was a good thing. He's a cool dude. We very much had the same vision, which
is really rare. It made for a situation
in which we felt we were actually creating something together."
'Last Cup Of Sorrow'
Says Gould, "It doesn't look like an MTV video, which I
like, it's definitely different."
The Artwork
In keeping with the theme the artwork too pays homage to the
movie, imitating the design of the 'Vertigo' cinema poster.
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