Jane’s Addiction may have caught the headlines in 2024 for all the wrong reasons. But all of the sympathy and nostalgia were justified. Their 1988 debut album, “Nothing’s Shocking”, more than any other release, perhaps, ushered “alternative rock” into the musical mainstream and announced the quartet as the wildest group around.
While its importance cannot be understated, how well does “Nothing’s Shocking” actually hold up? I am reviewing and revisiting the album and will be looking at whether we can still refer to Jane’s Addiction’s debut as a bonafide classic.
Jane’s Addiction Journey to Making “Nothing’s Shocking”
Years of fame and marvellous legacies tend to soften a band’s image. The NWA movie made the Compton rap group seem fun and charismatic. You may have seen the Guns n’ Roses tour lately, and they appear to be the kind of people you’d like to have around for dinner. And Ozzy Osbourne might be most famous for his reality television show.
But all of these cut menacing figures in their prime. It was in no small part fue to their reputation that these artists achieved their initial fame.
There seemed to be few more extreme bands out there than Jane’s Addiction, an artsy, drug-fueled, orgiastic art collective with plenty of ambition. If The Doors had turned 1960s kids onto philosophy and nasty drugs, Jane’s Addiction promised to do the very same thing at the tail end of the 1980s.
The band was led by Perry Farrell, a flamboyant, talented egomaniac who had fronted the goth/post-punk group Psi Com. Farrell’s voice couldn’t quite carry in the way that the classic rock singers could, but his confidence, charisma, and artsy ideas made him a fascinating figure on stage.
Integral to the early look and sound of the band, and even to their memorable name, was artist Casey Niccoli. She was Farrell’s girlfriend then and the muse for many of the band’s early songs.
Farrell was a lucky man. It wasn’t just Niccoli’s presence which helped the project. Excellent, untrained musicians rounded up Jane’s Addiction line-up. Childhood best friends Dave Navarro and Stephen Perkins joined on guitar and drums. Eric Avery, a bass player capable of delivering tremedously catchy lines, was the final addition.
You may have seen three-quarters of the band involved in a physical altercation on stage. But could they stand each other back in the late 1980s? Of course not!
The Alternative Rock Hype
Every music fan looking for an alternative to the glam-metal bands of Los Angeles wanted to see Jane’s Addiction play live during the late 1980s. They were a phenomenon on the club circuit, and the creative and personal tension at that point was mined to great effect, too.
Few were surprised when Warner Bros offered the group a major-label contract and an advance of a few hundred thousand grand. There were immediate ripples. Bands like Soundgarden and anything else that could be classified as “alternative rock” were suddenly fair game in major label bidding wars.
All Jane’s Addiction needed to do now was to survive their own hype once they recorded their first album.
“Nothing’s Shocking” Review
Does “Nothing’s Shocking” hold up? Or is it merely an heirloom of a different time? Both are correct. For the most part, the songs do hold up, and the energy of the group is palpable.
However, no, you are unlikely to appreciate “Nothing’s Shocking” as a masterpiece unless you view it in the context of its release.
Blame some of that on the production and a lot of it on the fact that many, many bands copied Jane’s Addiction’s sound. It’s the dynamics of the band that are integral to the way that they sound on record.
Eric Avery’s lyrical, repetitive bass lines are often at the forefront of songs, such as in the intro “Up the Beach” or “Moutain Song.” Navarro plays psychedelic swirls of the lead guitar against it while Farrell makes his best Jim Morrisson impression. Meanwhile, Perkins, arguably the band’s most reliable member, is also the one most hard-done-by the production values of 1980s records, and the endless amount of reverb placed over his drums.
But the lyrics and presentation are integral to the album’s success as well. “Up the Beach,” “Ocean Size,” and “Mountain Song” present Jane’s Addiction’s musicians as radical neo-hippies looking to escape the trappings of life on the grind in the big city.
On the other hand, tunes like “Had a Dad” and “Pigs in Zen” present Farrell and his band of misfits as rather deep thinkers interested in philosophy and characters hidden by America on its edges.
It’s these characters that lead them back into the mean, big city. There is a song about a serial killer, “Ted, Just Admit It…”. There are songs about sex, like “Summertime Rolls.” And, on the band’s finest hour, on “Jane Says,” Farrell creates a story around the group’s name.
Legacy of “Nothing’s Shocking”
Jane’s Addiction’s musicians are not virtuosos. They do not have a singer with pipes like Axl Rose. But they lean into their weirdness and limitations. “Nothing’s Shocking” possesses an incredible kind of energy and confidence.
Not everything here is a winner, but nearly everything is iconic within the alt-rock world. After its release, many groups, like The Red Hot Chili Peppers, would come to envy the wild, adventurous spirit of the group and their interests in art, sex and debauchery.
As many predicted, Jane’s Addiction broke up in a haze of acrimony and accusations fueled by wild drug addiction. Unlike anyone predicted, Jane’s Addiction made many, many returns. By 2024, they were playing the nostalgia circuit. A public fight ended it all again. For those who fell under their spell the first time around, it seemed the most appropriate way to call time on the group’s long, strange trip.
