How About That Thing?

There were a lot of things the 2010s did that sucked, didn’t work, and were even outright unforgivable. Primus reuniting was NOT one of those things. I guess even a cursed decade like the 2010s is allowed to have a mulligan here and there.

“Primus and The Chocolate Factory” was Primus’s 2014 album featuring an entire tracklist of covers of songs from the Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory soundtrack. Needless to say, the Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory soundtrack was the music that went with the Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory movie from 1971. The Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory movie from 1971 was a film adaptation of the Roald Dahl novel, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. Charlie and the Chocolate Factory… Uh… Something something Kevin Bacon. Yeah, this gag worked a lot better in the imaginary friends article back in April.

But yeah, doing an entire cover album of songs from Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. As the kids say nowadays, That’s definitely a choice. Not sure I’d have gone with that choice, but it could always be worse. They could’ve put out YET ANOTHER GOD DAMN COVER OF “AFRICA”!

I loved Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. It was strange, but in a child like way that only made sense if you were, like, seven or eight. Gene Wilder was a fantastic Wonka, and it’s definitely hard to imagine anybody else in the role. To put it bluntly: this movie is fantastic! END OF SALES PITCH!

But all that being said… I hadn’t really thought much about the movie for the better part of a decade. The last time I had any real chocolate factory related thoughts, it was when Tim Burton put out that attrocity of a movie in 2003. Yes, it might be more accurate to the source material. Good for you. Your movie still sucks. Instead of child like wonder, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory was basically Tim Burton doing Tim Burton things: making everything weird for weirdness’s sake, casting Johnny Dep as the lead… And I hate talking shit about Burton, because I liked a lot of his older movies. Hell, I’m probably the one human being on Earth who DIDN’T hate Monkeybone. But that? Yeesh!

And that was the last time I really thought about anything related to the ol’ chocolate factory. Until Primus showed up.

I admit, Primus was one of those bands I didn’t really appreciate until much later in life. I knew they wrote the theme song for South Park, and I know Les Claypool provided bass for Ozzy’s version of N.I.B. at one point (can you call it a cover if it’s already your song?). I remember trying to listen to them back around 2000, and… More than anything, I was confused. To borrow a quote from one of my long-time friends: “This sucks, but I can’t tell if it’s on purpose.”

It really wasn’t until the 2010s came around when I decided to give them a second try. And for whatever reason, it clicked this time. How? Why?

My only REAL theory on the matter is that in the early 2010s, I was in my mid-to-late twenties. The rock genre as a whole had gotten bored with nu-metal, and before everybody decided to get eaten by The Imagine dragon, there was the raunch rock phenomenon. As memory serves, it went from 2007 to about 2012, give or take. Either way, I was sick of it. Bands like Buckcherry, Theory of a Deadman, Halestorm, and My Darkest Days rose to the top. Long time bands like Dope, Pop Evil, and Papa Roach dipped their toe in the raunchiness in order to stay relevant. there were even a few one-hit wonders who were hoping their raunchy little song would get their foot in the door like Burn Halo. It reminded me of when hair metal was all the rage back in the 80s, except a lot of songs from THIS era were even worse. Also, everybody had been smartened up about that whole hair metal fashion sense coming right out of the gay bar… But I digress.

By the time 2011 had come around, I was fucking sick of every song being about a slutty woman whose sluttiness was extremely slutty. Whether it be a stripper, the boss’s daughter, a bad girlfriend, Lzzy Hale performing strip teases for the creepy neighbor across the street (because that’s what a logical human being does when they catch their neighbor peeping)… I was fucking sick of it! I demanded something different, and I demanded it yesterday!

And then, I found out Primus had apparently reunited. And after listening to their reunion album, “Green Naugahyde”, I was… Genuinely impressed. I couldn’t believe this was the band that weirded me out over a decade ago. I went and backtracked through their discography, and suddenly, I found myself not only liking what I heard, but I had a new favorite band!

And then, a couple years later, “Primus and the Chocolate Factory” came out. And… Wow. Just… Wow.

It’s not a bad album by any stretch of the imagination. I like a lot of the reimaginings of “The Candy Man Can”, and “Golden Ticket” just fine. “I Want it Now” was probably my favorite song on the album for the longest time, too.

Honestly, the only choice I wasn’t entirely onboard for was the fact each Oompa-Loompa song was included as a separate track. And really, my only complaint is that they didn’t really do anything different for each song. It’s practically the exact same instrumental every single time, and the only thing that changes is which kid it’s about. Even the original movie did a couple of things differently with the oompa-loompa songs. IE, Mike TV’s oompa-loompa song was sung in a different key from the other three, Augustus Gloop’s song was sung faster, etc.

It’s kind of a minor nitpick of an otherwise… Interesting album.

My one regret was I never got ahold of any of the promotional chocolate bars that apparently came with special editions. Like a chump, I went with the more affordable standard version of the physical album. Had I known the deluxe edition came with chocolate bars, I probably would’ve invested more.

On the other hand… Yeah, I think I’ll stay away from the Professor Nutbutter variation. The Krinkle Bar would’ve been interesting, the Bastard bar would’ve been interesting… Hell, I’d probably even try the Pork Soda bar. But I don’t know, man. Something about the word “nutbutter”…

Claypool himself apparently liked to joke about how this album was actually an advertisement for their chocolate bars. I can’t find the DIRECT quote anymore, but he said something along the lines of “We decided to start selling chocolate because the internet ruined the whole music thing. Meanwhile, nobody’s figured out how to digitize chocolate yet.”

Primus and the Chocolate Factory is a good album overall… But I’ll admit, it’s not a primus album I go back to regularly. Honestly, once the novelty of a cover album of Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory came and went, I find I don’t really listen to it nearly as often as the others. However, I do like to revisit it every now and then. All and all, I recommend giving it a listen.