CAN U BELIEVE THIS EXTREME JAM?

Say what you will about its corny message and lulzy ’90s in-your-faceness, but let us all face facts about Extreme’s “Get The Funk Out”: Holy ballz this jam is the work of superstuds. For starters, drummer Paul Geary just rips on it, esp on those big entrances to the choruses (i.e. on the “If you”s); the second one (at 1:53) is what a renowned musicologist may describe as mega-bonerz awesome. With Geary in charge, the whole band locks ass-tight into the swing. I love!

“Funk”‘s top billing, however, belongs to guitar ace Nuno Bettencourt, who enjoys the double satisfaction of being an eye-popping virtuoso and of being hotter than most chicks if we’re being honest here. (Way to crush my chops and confuse my boner, Bettencourt you jerk.) All his verse and chorus parts scream, and he scronks among the horn section awesomely. Act one of his monster solo (at 2:48) is split into some tasty speed-blues and then a series of mind-bottling tapping runs, which are hard as shit for both the needed precision to execute them and for the capacity to like order them in your brain. But it’s not just technique and shit — the shit is beautiful to the ear. Fuck dude.

Then the jam levels off for the solo’s second phase, in which Bettencourt alternates fluid and sticky blues stuff, just white hot. (I tack on a big rake in its last measure DHM.) Oh but what of much-maligned singer Gary Cherone (ex-Van Halen), all shirtless in overalls and skiddle-dee-biddle-dee-bop scatting? Awesome, that’s fucking what! A listener can tell he really feels these lyrics; he’s selling the shit like it’s about to spoil. He wishes fun and unity on everybody (via wiggerish arm movements, dancing chastely with big jugz lady), and totally owns the last minute of the song — though I love this shit so much that I get depressed when it starts winding down. Crank it!

–ADF