BIOGRAPHY – Mike Patton

For the last twenty years, Mike Patton has been one of the most active, unique and respected artists in the music industry, having gained acclaim for his work through a variety of projects, including Faith No More, Mr. Bungle, Tomahawk, Fantômas, Peeping Tom and various solo projects, including a recent foray into Italian pop opera with Mondo Cane. His dynamic vocal range has included rap, falsetto, growling, swing and even contributing the voices for the monsters in the Will Smith motion picture I Am Legend. All this in such a short space of time, forty-two year old Patton has remained constantly busy since first enterting the music industry at the age of twenty-one.

Michael Allan Patton was born on January 27th 1968 in Eureka, a coastal town in Humboldt County, California. Having developed a passion for music at an early age, Patton formed his first group, Mr. Bungle whilst sill in high school. Taking their name from an educational film entitled Lunchroom Manners, the band consisted of Patton on vocals and friends Trey Spruance, Trevor Dunn, Jed Watts and Theo Lengyel. The band’s first recording was a demo entitled The Raging Wrath of the Easter Bunny in 1986, which demonstrated Patton’s wide taste in music, and was soon followed by the equally diverse Bowel of Chiley, Goddammit I Love America! and OU818.

In early 1989, San Francisco-based funk metal band Faith No More were forced to fire their erratic frontman Chuck Moseley and search for a suitable replacement. They had already composed and recorded songs for their third album but required a singer to write lyrics and perform vocals over their tracks. Patton was selected after guitarist Jim Martin heard one of Mr. Bungle‘s demos and was impressed by the young singer’s voice and attitude. Given just two weeks to write and perform his contributions, the resulting effort was entitled The Real Thing and was released by the Slash label in the summer of 1989, aided by the lead single From Out of Nowhere two months later. After the release of the second single, Epic, which would later become the group’s signature tune, Faith No More began to receive regular airplay on music channels and the album was nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Metal Performance. The group embarked on an extensive tour to promote the album, which eventually resulted in 1991′s Live at the Brixton Academy and the accompanying home video, You Fat B**tards.

Even as Faith No More had broken into the mainstream and had become one of the most in-demand groups in the metal scene, Patton continued to perform with Mr. Bungle and the band released their eponymous debut album in August 1991. The same year, Faith No More reworked an older track, Sweet Emotion (originally released on a Kerrang! flexi-disc), into The Perfect Crime and contributed it to the soundtrack to the hit sci-fi comedy Bill and Ted’s Bogus Journey, which also featured performances from Kiss, Megadeth and Steve Vai. Martin would also make a cameo in the movie as himself, credited as Sir Jim Martin, head of the Faith No More Spiritual and Theological Center. The band defied expectations with their follow-up to The Real Thing. Their second album with Patton, 1992′s Angel Dust, dispensed with the funk of its predecessor and would feature more artistic contribution from Patton, who had not been present during the recording of the previous album.

Despite refusing to simply repeat themselves, Faith No More scored yet another triumph with the album, which would include the hit singles Midlife Crisis and A Small Victory. When their cover of the Commodores track Easy became their third hit single in a row (and was included on their Songs to Make Love To EP), the album was re-released with the song as a bonus track. All three singles were released in limited edition coloured vinyl. Faith No More once again set out to promote their album worldwide, supporting Guns N’ Roses on their Use Your Illusion tour. Martin expressed disappointment in the direction the band had taken and, the following summer, decided the leave the group and work on his solo material. Unable to work on their next album without a guitarist, Patton recruited the help of his Mr. Bungle collaborator Spruance for the recording of what would become King for a Day… Fool for a Lifetime. The album would be largely dismissed by critics for being more straightforward than the band’s previous efforts and would fail to score any hit singles.

Patton and Spruance once again worked together immediately afterwards on Mr. Bungle‘s softomore effort, 1995′s Disco Volante, which was greeted with greater enthusiasm from the press. In 1996, Patton released his first solo album Adult Themes for Voice, which was allegedly recorded in a hotel room whilst Faith No More were on tour. Typical of Patton, the album was not comprised of traditional songs and did not chart. After recruiting guitarist Jon Hudson, Faith No More recorded their final album together, which they ironically titled Album of the Year. Whilst Ashes to Ashes, Last Cup of Sorrow and Stripsearch were regularly played on MTV, the album once again failed to gain the acclaim their earlier work had achieved and in 1998, after releasing covers of the Sparks‘ track This Town Ain’t Big Enough for Both of Us (a collaboration for the latter’s album Plagiarism) Bee Gees‘ I Started a Joke, Faith No More performed their final show and announced their split.

The following year, Patton released two albums, as well as making appearances on recordings for Sepultura (whom he had previously done on their 1996 album Roots), Tin Hat Trio and Maldoror. His first full release was the debut album by his latest project Fantômas, whilst the second was his latest record with Mr. Bungle, California. He also collaborated for the second of ten times with John Zorn on the album Taboo & Exile. In 2001, Patton released the debut from yet another project, Tomahawk, which saw him work alongside The Jesus Lizard‘s Duane Denison, The Melvins‘ Kevin Rutmanis and Helmet‘s John Stanier. The same year, Fantômas released their second album, The Director’s Cut, and the following year Patton collaborated with Hemophiliac, The Dillinger Escape Plan and Rollins Band.

Tomahawk released their third album, Mit Gas, in 2003, whilst Fantômas followed with their fourth, Delìrium Còrdia, in 2004. Patton formed a new project, Peeping Tom, who released their self-titled debut album in May 2006, whilst Tomahawk would release a third, Anonymous, in 2007. The same year, Patton was suggested by one of his friends to contribute demonic growls for the monsters in Will Smith’s science fiction action movie I Am Legend, which was based on the classic story by Richard Matheson. In 2008 he composed the soundtrack to the independent comedy A Perfect Place, as well as 2009′s Crank: High Voltage. He also worked with a variety of artists, lending his vocals to tracks by Dub Trio, Praxis, Serj Tankian (frontman for System of a Down) and Zu.

In 2007, Patton had commenced work on what would become his third solo album. Inspired by the Italian pop culture during his marriage to artist Titi Zuccatosta (which lasted from 1995 to 2001), Patton collaborated with an orchestra and reworked a variety of Italian songs from the 1950s and 1950s (including the track Deep Down, from Mario Bava’s 1968 comic book movie Danger: Diabolik). His concert dates were a tremendous success and the material was recorded under the name Mondo Cane, taking its name from a 1963 Italian documentary movie (translated as A Dog’s World). In early 2009, it was announced that Faith No More would be reforming after over a decade, despite earlier internal conflicts, although Martin had decided not to participate. The band began to perform once again that summer and a two-disc retrospective The Very Best Definitive Ultimate Greatest Hits Collection (the sixth to-date, although the band had no input in the earlier ones). At present, there has been no plans for Faith No More to record a new album.