When it was brought to my attention that Prong‘s Cleansing recently turned 20 years old, my mind was pretty much blown. See, 1994 was also the year that I started to identify myself as a metal fan. It had been part of my listening habits for several years prior to varying degrees. Bands like Poison, Def Leppard, and Cinderella co-existed with Huey Lewis & the News, Mr. Mister, and Falco.
Thankfully, before the next wave of pop dreck could take hold, along came Metallica, Guns N’ Roses, and the grunge movement. Soon I was watching Beavis & Butthead watch videos and I found myself staying up late to catch full versions of those videos on Headbanger’s Ball. The music I had grown up listening to started to fall by the wayside as I continued down this darker, more fulfilling path.
Among those videos was “Snap Your Fingers, Snap Your Neck.” Our heroes may not have been that impressed, but I was floored, a complete 180 from my indifference towards the “Unconditional” clip I had seen prior. Of course, this was an all-new Prong, with founder/guitarist/vocalist Tommy Victor and ex-Swans drummer Ted Parsons joined by ex-Killing Joke/Murder Inc. members Paul Raven on bass and John Bechdel on keyboards.
From here, things get blurry; the events previously described may not even be entirely accurate. Whatever the case, Prong was soon opening for Pantera and Sepultura on their Far Beyond Driven and Chaos A.D. tours, respectively, and I owned a copy of Cleansing. I’ve been a fan ever since, and even went back to and developed an appreciation for the earlier albums.
But, nothing I’ve said so far really explains why we should be celebrating, much less commemorating, the album. It didn’t redefine a genre like Heartwork or Slaughter of the Soul; it didn’t rocket them to superstar status like Vulgar Display of Power or the aforementioned Chaos A.D.; and it wasn’t a triumphant return from tragedy like …And Justice For All or Back In Black. However, a case can be made that those are the very reasons why it was significant: It should have redefined a genre. It should have rocketed them to superstar status. And it’s a tragedy that it didn’t.
Industrial sounds made a surprising push into the mainstream in the early 90s, lead by the metallic crunch of Nine Inch Nails and Ministry, with the heavy electronics of genre stalwarts KMFDM and Front 242 not far behind; even Frontline Assembly was getting into the act thanks to relationships with bands like Pantera and Fear Factory. Prong had experimented with industrial/electronic elements on 1991’s Prove You Wrong, and by bringing Raven and Bechdel into the fold, were clearly intent on continuing in that direction.
Cleansing would be a marked change in sound. Foremost, the production was much cleaner – more listenable, you might say – than even their previous major label efforts. The sound was bigger; the songwriting was ridiculously hooky. Hell, the thing charted at #126 on Billboard and spawned three singles, two of which had at least moderately budgeted videos. So where were all the fans?
Looking back, the album was a bit “niche,” with not enough of any one thing to have the impact akin to any of the landmark albums mentioned above. Long-time Prong fans were likely turned off by the band’s cleaner, updated sound; it wasn’t industrial enough to attract the rivetheads and baby goths that were busy drawing “NIN” on their high school backpacks; it wasn’t heavy enough to draw the extreme metal fan; it wasn’t “macho” enough to fit into the groove metal movement that was in its infancy; it was too heavy to appeal to even those worshipping at the altars of Soundgarden and Alice In Chains in the dying days of grunge; it was too angry for a mainstream whose tastes in guitar-driven music had begun to shift to the bubblegum sounds of pop punk.
Most likely, the easiest way to put it is that Cleansing was simply too far ahead of its time to be truly appreciated by the masses. Or perhaps just too damn good. The first five tracks here remain essentially unfuckwithable. They sound as good as they did 20 years ago – and they still sound fresh. You don’t listen to Cleansing and instinctively think, “Ahh the mid-90s – those were the days, man…” the way you might other albums from the era. Its not that the rest of the album is bad, just that those set an incredibly high bar, spawning earworms that may lay dormant but never actually leave. Hell, “Out of This Misery” might actually be the heaviest thing here, while the band shows a dynamic range with lower-key cuts “Not of This Earth” and “Sublime.”
It is difficult to pinpoint the album’s greater influence because there hasn’t really been anything like it (or a band like Prong) since. Static X has probably come closest but they have a much more commercial lean. Then there were obscure 90s bands like The Hunger and Monster Voodoo Machine that combined those industrial influences with heavy guitar groove, but any buzz they generated was short lived (in defense of the latter, though, Suffersystem was one hell of an album.) Additionally, “Snap Your Fingers, Snap Your Neck” has been prominently covered by the likes of Demon Hunter and Six Feet Under – poorly, with both bands failing to capture the x-factor which made the original so memorable and aurally devastating. (It probably didn’t help that their respective sounds are markedly different from Prong’s, their chosen styles so burdened by sterotype and cliché as to render their attempts laughable at best.)
This era of Prong (continued with 1997’s grossly underappreciated Rude Awakening) was one of a kind – rarely imitated, never duplicated; classic to some, obscure to most. For me, Cleansing was integral in my musical evolution. It took me one step further from the mainstream dreck where I could continue to discover new bands to add to my collection. Hell, I went so far as to craft my own version of the Prong logo as seen on the album cover (yet inspired by Soundgarden’s Chris Cornell) from a fork I stole from the local Pizza Hut. And yes, I even wore it on a chain around my neck.
