Sex & Religion
| Sex & Religion | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Studio album by Steve Vai | ||||
|
Publication |
July 1993 |
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| Label (s) | Epic , Relativity | |||
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Title (number) |
14th |
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|
running time |
59:18 |
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| occupation | ||||
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Sex & Religion is the third studio album by American rock musician Steve Vai . It was released in July 1993 under the labels Epic Records and Relativity Records .
Trivia
The planned album title was initially Vai . Then Light Without Heat (according to Vais Equipment Company) was planned. However, this title had to be changed again due to copyright problems. Devin Townsend played on the album . Townsend co-wrote Pig and Just Cartilage with Vai . Vai also worked with Desmond Child on the song In My Dreams with You . The cover design is imitated by Sebastian .
Background and conflict
For this album, Vai wanted to use some sort of all-star cast that included Vai himself, Devin Townsend , TM Stevens, and Terry Bozzio . Vai found the album to be extremely important after Passion and Warfare and should be perfect for it. So Vai worked slowly and very accurately on the album, which took too long for the band members. After the album was recorded, the line-up split and Vai toured alone with Townsend and other session musicians.
reception
| Professional reviews | |
|---|---|
| source | rating |
| Allmusic |
 
|
| Metal hammer |
 
|
Dirk Winter saw the merging of jazz and heavy metal in the Darmstädter Echo ambivalent. "[S] ofen a basic theme is recognizable as a red thread", it sounds interesting, but more than once there is no "compositional framework" and the resulting "mishmash" obscures Vai's real skill that flashes in his solos. The Musikexpress did not see the equality of rock catchiness and jazzy intricacy as problematic, "because this man can tell stories with his guitar - sometimes simply and melodically, then again in a virtuoso manner within the framework of incomprehensible arrangements", just like in Zappa's time. 5 out of 6 possible stars were awarded.
In Break Out , Vai said that his album was a juxtaposition of “commercial” and “hair-raising” structures, which the interviewer summarized under the term “versatility”. The same term was used twice in Guitar & Bass to characterize the work located in the middle between the commercial Skyscraper (recorded as a member of the David Lee Roth Band) and the guitar-technical predecessor Passion and Warfare . Even Barney Greenway raised them in the Rock Hard out: "It rules the versatility - and more than the obvious commercialism, like hear the Vai-supporter." He distributed nine of 10 possible points. Two issues later, Achim Karstens found in the introduction to the interview: "It may take a lot of effort and nerves to get through the sometimes noisy and jazz-heavy compositions, but the result is more than satisfactory."
In Metal Hammer , Martin Gross wrote that the album was “anything but free from toothless and muddle”, and in the same issue Michael Lorant found it zappaesque to “ Kravitz- like greasy”, which was worth 6 out of 7 points. More than six years after the timely reviews, Hammer employee Stefan Wodach stated that Sex & Religion had "failed gracefully".
The music website Allmusic only awarded two stars out of five for the album. Allmusic critic Stephen Thomas Erlewine described it as "predictable, conventional and boring".
The album peaked at number 48 on the Billboard 200 in 1993. The single In My Dreams with You peaked at number 36 on the Main Stream Rock Charts.
Track list
- An Earth Dweller's Return ( Steve Vai ) - 1:03
- Here & Now ( Steve Vai ) - 4:47
- In My Dreams with You ( Steve Vai , Desmond Child , Roger Greenawalt) - 5:00
- Still My Bleeding Heart ( Steve Vai ) - 6:00
- Sex & Religion ( Steve Vai ) - 4:24
- Dirty Black Hole ( Steve Vai ) - 4:27
- Touching Tongues ( Steve Vai ) - 4:33
- State of Grace ( Steve Vai ) - 1:41
- Survive ( Steve Vai ) - 4:46
- Pig ( Steve Vai , Devin Townsend ) - 3:36
- The Road to Mt. Calvary ( Steve Vai ) - 2:35
- Down Deep Into the Pain ( Steve Vai ) - 8:01
- Rescue Me or Bury Me ( Steve Vai ) - 8:25
- Just Cartilage ( Steve Vai , Devin Townsend ) - 4:19 bonus track Japan
Singles
- Down Deep into the Pain / I Would Love to
- In My Dreams with You / Erotic Nightmares
Awards for music sales
| Country / Region | Award | Sales |
|---|---|---|
| Awards for music sales (country / region, Award, Sales) |
||
 France (SNEP)
|
- | 10,900 |
 United States (RIAA)
|
- | 182,069 |
| All in all | - | 192.969 |
Main article: Steve Vai / Discography # Awards for Music Sales
Individual evidence
- ↑ Sex & Religion Liner Notes
- ^ Sex & Religion Messageboard , Vai.com.
- ^ Sex & Religion Disc Notes ( Memento January 29, 2009 in the Internet Archive ), Vai.com.
- ^ Sex & Religion ( Memento of January 29, 2009 in the Internet Archive ), Vai.com.
- ↑ Dirk Winter: Jazz crossed with hard rock. “Witcher” Steve Vai taps the wrong way on “Sex and Religion” . In: Darmstädter Echo . September 11, 1993.
- ↑ (ob): Vai. Sex and religion . In: Musikexpress . August 1993, p. 56 .
- ^ Petra Rottmann: Steve Vai. Axeman on unfamiliar paths . In: Break Out . (August / September), 1993, pp. 43 .
- ↑ Lothar Trampert: Vai! Steve Vai on the middle ground… In: Guitar & Bass . The musician magazine. August 1993, p. 18-29 .
- ^ Barney Greenway: Steve Vai. Sex & Religion . In: Rock Hard . No. 75 , August 1993.
- ↑ Achim Karstens: Steve Vai. Humor, musicality & style . In: Rock Hard . No. 77 , October 1993, p. 104 .
- ^ Martin Gross: Flying Vai Again . In: Metal Hammer . August 1993, p. 40 f .
- ↑ Michael Lorant: Steve Vai. Sex & Religion . In: Metal Hammer . August 1993.
- ↑ Stefan Woldach: Steve Vai. It's hard to be a god . In: Metal Hammer . December 1999, p. 48 f .
- ↑ Information, criticism of Allmusic
- ↑ Charts, Awards Allmusic
- ↑ Sales figures for Sex & Religion in France ( Memento from January 10, 2020 in the Internet Archive )
- ^ Sludge Scan For December 1999 | Metal Sludge , accessed February 20, 2015, metalsludge.tv