Sailing the Seas of Cheese

Updated on Oct 28, 2023

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Released May 14, 1991 Label Interscope Release date 14 May 1991		Length 45:43 Artist Primus Producer Primus

Recorded January – February 1991 Studio Fantasy Studios, Berkeley, California Sailing the Seas of Cheese (1991) Miscellaneous Debris (1992) Genres Alternative rock, Funk metal, Progressive rock, Alternative metal, Experimental rock Nominations Grammy Award for Best Surround Sound Album Similar Primus albums, Experimental rock albums

Primus sailing the seas of cheese full album

Sailing the Seas of Cheese is the second studio album and major-label debut by Primus, released on May 14, 1991. It spawned three singles: "Jerry Was a Race Car Driver", "Tommy the Cat", and "Those Damned Blue-Collar Tweekers". "Jerry Was a Race Car Driver" appeared in the video games ATV Offroad Fury, Tony Hawk's Pro Skater,Rock Band 3, and as downloadable content for Rocksmith 2014, while "American Life" appears in Tony Hawk's Project 8.

Seas of cheese

Album information

The album contains several samples from other media:

"Jerry Was a Race Car Driver" contains a sample from the movie The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2 in which the character Chop Top exclaims "Dog will hunt!"

"Los Bastardos" contains samples from the BBC television series The Young Ones including Vyvyan shouting, "Shut up, you bastards!" as well as Rick saying, "You just called me a bastard, didn't you?" and "Mike, you bastard!"

The lyrics "sail the seas of cheese" from "Seas of Cheese" would later appear in the song "DMV" off of their next album Pork Soda, as well as the song "Dirty Drowing Man" off of Antipop.

The song "Eleven" is in an unusual time-metric of 11/8, hence the name.

Live performance

The album was performed live in its entirety in 2003 and 2004 on their Tour De Fromage, on December 30, 2010 and once more during a two night show at Royal Albert Hall in April 2012.

Critical reception

Reviewing the album for AllMusic, Steve Huey contends that "Sailing the Seas of Cheese completely redefined the possibilities of the electric bass in rock music for those who'd never heard the group before." He describes the album as "mostly riff-driven, fleshing out their heavy metal roots with prog rock tricks from Rush and Frank Zappa, as well as the novelty side of Zappa's sense of humor." He notes that "the willful goofiness may alienate some listeners, but... it never detracts from the band's frequently stunning musicianship" and concludes that this album is "the tightest, most song-oriented representation of their jaw-dropping, one-of-a-kind style." Simon Reynolds reviews the album for Entertainment Weekly by describing Primus as "too self-consciously goofy for their own good, but their rubber-boned thrash-funk can be cartoonish fun."

Track listing

All lyrics written by Les Claypool; all music composed by Primus, guitar melodies on "Tommy the Cat" and "Sgt. Baker" by Todd Huth.

Release history

Sailing the Seas of Cheese reached Gold status March 1993. It was certified platinum in December 2001.

2009

Plain Recordings released a 180 gram version of the LP.

2013 Reissue

A deluxe edition of the album was released on May 21, 2013. It is available in two six-panel Digipak configurations, each featuring the album’s new stereo mix on CD and the new 5.1 surround mix on Blu-ray or DVD, plus three exclusive, previously unreleased bonus tracks.” Claypool stated, “Musically, it holds up incredibly well. Sonically, it holds up fairly well. There’s some old-style reverbs that are a little bit syrupy. With modern technology, we can fix some of that stuff. But we don’t want to mess with it too much, because it is what it is. We want to fatten it up a little bit.”

Charts

Album - Billboard (North America)

Singles - Billboard (North America)

Songs

1Seas of Cheese0:42
2Here Come the Bastards2:55
3Sgt Baker4:17

References

Sailing the Seas of Cheese Wikipedia

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