FANTÔMAS released their second album 'The Director's Cut' 17 years ago!

The second studio album from Fantômas was released on July 9th 2001 via Ipecac. The record is a collection of cover versions of Horror movie soundtrack music selected by Mike Patton.



Kerrang!

With fans still recovering from the realisation that this wasn't fnm, Messrs Patton, Dunn, Lombardo and Buzzo threw another curveball with an album of classic film score covers. Though the source material offered a more tangible framework for their brain-fried psychosis, the results were spectacular. Who else would have turned 'The Omen' into a speed metal meltdown with demonic choir?

NME

For Mike Patton, it’s all about walking the knife edge; dedicating oneself to doing the last thing people expect of you. When the scatological excesses of Faith No More became a well-worn cliché, Patton split the band. Post-FNM vehicle Fantomas steers his sonic vision into schizophrenic and supremely fucked-up territories. The second LP from the Fantomas quartet (Patton, Melvins’ Buzz Osbourne, ex-Slayer drummer Dave Lombardo and Mr Bungle’s Trevor Dunn) comprises 16 reinterpreted scores from movies like 'Rosemary’s Baby', 'The Omen' and so forth. God knows how the various composers reacted to this gleeful butchering. But it takes genius to realise that Nino Rota’s 'Godfather' score could be immeasurably improved by a man barking "GODFATHER! GODFATHER! WOO-HA!” over the top.
If it all sounds wearyingly self-indulgent on paper, you have to hear things like the 'Cape Fear' theme, a sliced-up outpouring of metallic doom, to believe extravagance could sound so good. While this is miles away from the mainstream, some of the finest moments here Henry Mancini’s ‘Charade’ for one recall FNM’s glorious pomp. Patton croons devilishly while skyscrapers collapse behind him, and the result is pure rock operatics. Muse? My arse!