With their latest release, the Mars Volta have solidified their position as one of the most musically audacious bands in the mainstream today. Continuing in the epic progressive nature of their previous release, "Deloused in the Comatorium", "Frances the Mute" sees the band pushing the boundaries even further, making for a somewhat jarring but undoubtedly engaging listen.

The album begins with "Cygnus...Vismund Cygnus", a sprawling 13-minute epic. The song sort of builds up in reverse, firing out of the gate with wild jazzy time changes, eventually melting into spacious guitar melodies, and finally concluding with an odd electronic bit.

From there, the album mainly continues in the multi-part epic fashion, with the exception of the more radio-friendly ballad "The Widow". Much like "Televators", from "Deloused...", this song serves as a brief respite from the musical madness. However, it ends with a long, ambient outro that goes on for a bit too long, and drags the song out a bit more than it really needs to be.

"L'Via L'Viaquez" is perhaps the highlight of the album, boasting a strong Latin influence. The song is filled with scintillating salsa-esque rhythms, adding a catchiness to the wild, technical jazz structures, and features lyrics both in English and Spanish. At 12 minutes in length, the song goes by surprisingly fast.

The remaining two epics, "Miranda, That Ghost Just Isn't Holy Anymore" and "Cassandra Gemini", delve even deeper into unpredictable weirdness. Each is spread over several tracks, totaling at around 27 and 20 minutes respectively.

The jazz influence in these songs is taken to even greater extremes, featuring trumpet, flutes, and saxophone (Red Hot Chili Peppers bassist Flea even contributes some nice trumpet work). Omar Rodriguez-Lopez's jagged guitar rhythms and Jon Theodore's octopus-like drumming are showcased here like never before, and the high-pitched cathartic wails of frontman Cedric Bixler Zavala anchor it all very nicely.

Combining jazz and rock stylings hasn't been commercially viable since the 70's, but these guys put an extremely fresh and exciting spin on it, and manage to sound very natural and cutting-edge in the process. The music seems rather chaotic at first, but for the most part, everything flows together very well.

I realize this previous description was a bit vague, but the reason is that there is so much going on in these two songs, it is extremely difficult to put it into words. It's really something you just have to hear for yourself.

Epic, unpredictable, and quite intense, the Mars Volta are most certainly not for the faint of heart. However, those who appreciate progressive rock, or any daring and challenging style of musical art will find great worth in this, one of the best and most exciting releases of the year.

'Frances The Mute' immediately lays all doubts to rest, that yes, it's possible that the Mars Volta could exceed the grandiosity and pretentiousness of 'Deloused in the Comatorium'. Running at over 80 minutes, there's no denying the sheer ambition of music's most hypersonic duos, Cedric Bixler and Omar Rodriguez. This CD builds upon the template of their debut, and takes it a step further; just more of everything, more blistering guitar solos, more musical scope/experimentation, and generally more monumental. Once again, Cedric's wails and the fierce Page-Karoli-Santana guitar solos of Omar Rodriguez, dominate the album. Certainly Jon Theodore's frenetic Mitch Mitchell-esque drumming style should not be overlooked as well. The 'prog-rock meets classic rock' comparisons have been beaten into the ground, but in fact that would be accurate, going from moody Pink Floyd/Hawkwind sections to self-aggrandizing solos that would make Jimmy Page and Carlos Santana proud. Thrown into the mix are some avant-garde twists, 'Via l'Viaquez' has it's flamenco moments, the 30 minute magnum opus 'Cassandra Geminni' is sprinkled with Ornette Coleman sax-flurrys. It almost seems like the Mars Volta has been blessed with musical speaking-in-tongues, capturing the spirit of a different age unleashed as a musical mosaic, and the most impressive thing is that it works. 'Frances The Mute' is an astonishing album, breathtaking musicanship, progressive in it's spirit, and majestic in it's ambition. Definitley one of the strongest CD's of 2005.

Frances the Mute is The Mars Volta's second full length release. Deloused in the Comatorium was a promising debut after an equally good EP. It was heralded by critics and fans alike. Frances the Mute continues along the path The Mars Volta took in Deloused but it also finds the band adding some new elemnents to their sound. Some of these additions work while others just serve to dilute the songs.

Cedric Bixler is the biggest draw for me. The instrumental work is decent but then band is nothing without Cedric's excellent voice and lyrics. Here, as in Deloused, Cedric's voice is strong on every track. Frances also finds Bixler experimenting with voice manipulation. Although, not a big part of the album, what's there does serve as a detriment to the album. Cedric has a great voice but he should leave the manipulation to singers more adapt in that area like Mr.Doctor(Devil Doll) and Mike Patton(Fantomas, Mr.Bungle). When Cedric does it, it just sounds odd, unnatural and out of place.

As in Deloused and Tremulant, the songs are lengthy. The shortest clocks in at 5 minutes, 3 clock in at 12-13 minutes and yet another clocks in at over 30 minutes. Now, length is never a problem for me. Some of the greatest songs of the modern era like Devil Doll's Dies Irae or The girl who was...death clock in at above an hour. Here, however, the songs feel overly lengthy. There are parts in every song that just don't add anything to the music.

There's boring ambient noise in each of the tracks that serves to dilute the overall sound. It's almost as if the boys at The Mars Volta, known ecentrics, added it to make it seem more 'experimental'. Well, I enjoy experimental music as much as the next guy but only when it works. It doesn't work here. Even the widow feels to long with only 3 minutes of passable music and two minutes of needless noise. I can enjoy a 13 minute song as much as the next guy but here in Cygnus...Vismund Cygnus we have an 8 minute song masquerading as a 13 minute one. It's just not needed and makes the overall album less pleasing. If there was more cohesion to this album, it could have easily been a 5 star release. There are some 5 star moments in here but also some 1 or 2 star moments that serve to bring down the overall quality of each song.

It is easy to tell The Mars Volta's influences on this album as well. Deloused was more of an original release than this. Parts of Via l'Viaquez sound like a Santana song with a different vocalist. Yet, another part of that song made me recall parts of the Kill Bill soundtrack. Other influences like Robert Plant and Jimmy Page are clearly heard in the album. It's nice when artists are influenced by others but here it seems that they filch a thing too many from others instead of shaping their own sound.

Frances the Mute is a good album despite it's flaws. Some better editing on the part of the band along with removal of about 10-15 minutes on needless noise could have made this a really strong album. The album has been receiving the "It's weird and we don't understand it so it must be brilliant treatment". I'm all for experimental sounds but some of it here just doesn't work. If you are looking some good and original experimental music check out better releases like Choirs of the Eye by Kayo Dot. However, if you want a good albeit a bit muddled rock release with a good vocalist then you'll like this. If you liked Deloused then you'll probably like this as well. Just be wary that it introduces some detrimental aspects and suffers from lack of cohesion. With some better editing this could have been one of the best releases in years. As it stands, it's a good release that doesn't quite reach greatness due to some unneeded boring parts.

this is not an album that most people like right away. It does take some getting used to. The songs do drag on at times, but overall frances the mute (in my opinion) is one of the most poignant, inventive, and powerful album i have EVER heard. I feel very proud of the fact that my fellow latinos have recorded some of these songs in spanish. AND FOR EVERYONES INFORMATION...THOSE "CRICKETS" ARE NOT CRICKETS, THEY ARE COQUI (CO-KEE)FROGS NATIVE TO PUERTO RICO. OMAR IS PUERTO RICAN.

I don't really know how to start this review. I'm kicking back, have L' Via L' Viaquez on full blast, and an ice cold beer in my hand, and I'm thinking to myself, life could not be any better.

I think one thing that needs to be established right now is the fact that there is not a *better* or *worst* album out of the epic De-Loused, and absolutely stunning Frances (or any albums for that matter). I think there is personal preference, and is exactly how people *should* write their reviews. So to begin with, I *will* say that I do prefer Frances over De-Loused.

So why do I prefer Frances? A lot of people would laugh at me and say that it doesn't even touch the beautiful artwork that De-Loused is, and that it's over-ambience is just simply annoying. I think this album is definately one of those "required tastes" albums if you may.

After listening to track 1, Cygnus...Vismund Cygnus for the very first time, I felt the song was all over the place, and unfocused. I knew at that moment that this entire album would take a while to digest. After listening to it a series of times, I began to realize that it was some sort of effect that TMV threw in as a curveball. The song seems to be screaming out "Will you have the patience to take the time to listen to me? If not, get the hell out. If so, sit back and enjoy the ride". And boy oh boy I've been enjoying the ride for quite some time (I got the album when shortly after it came out).

One major thing to address about the album, I believe, is it's amount of ambience. The ambience doesn't bother me the least bit. Infact, I think it enhances the life the album presents. The ending sequence of Cygnus makes me feel like i'm sitting on a roadside, watching and listening to traffic go by. When I listen to the ending sequence of The Widow, I feel like i'm listening to a broken record that is suddenly and slowly going insane (as if the broken record had any sort of life). The buildup to L' Via L' Viaquez is completely necessary, as I don't think i'd like the song as much if it completely exploded out of The Widow's ending ambience. Essentially what I'm coming to, is that the ambience fits, and it fits wonderfully. The band decided that they wanted to incorporate it in the album, and they executed it beautifully.

As I listen to the improvisation of the trumpets on Miranda That Ghost Just Isn't Holy Anymore, I can't help but focus my attention on the extravagance of their wonderful musicality. These are fine musicians.

The ambience of Miranda has passed and Cassandra Gemini has exploded into the scene and come to steal the show. This song is simply indescribable. I won't go into specific details, but if you focus your attention on this song for the full 33 or so minutes it shines, you will simply be blown away by it's wonderful progression and substance (maybe not at the first or second listen, as this album IS one of those "aquired taste" albums). This is such a great piece of artwork.

To go ahead and answer more thoroughly the question I stated in paragraph 3, I prefer Frances over De-Loused because it took me longer to appreciate it. That challenge made me really gain very much appreciation for the amount of musicality that flows through this album. Not that De-Loused lacks that musicality, it just seems that Frances helped me sprout a whole new level of appreciation that I thought wasn't possible, for honestly any album. (No doubt there are albums I like more than Frances, but this rare appreciation began with Frances and a select couple of other albums I began to appreciate, only after I started loving Frances).

This album is wonderful. Some people will recognize it, some won't. If you are the type of person that isn't impatient and loves to decipher complicated and hard-to-like-at-first-listen music, this album is made just for you. For the person that is impatient and wants to hear the same boring three chorded poppy song that plays on the radio quite often, I suggest you stop reading this review NOW. (Though i don't think I should even have to say that, they've already lost patience enough with my review and probably stopped reading by the 2nd paragraph).

There are many things to discover about this album. If you do not already have a copy of this masterpiece, do yourself a favor and buy it at your local record store. Or, if you are lazy like myself, buy it here off of Amazon. You simply won't regret it. And maybe, just maybe, it may be more enjoyable than you thought it'd be, and heck, maybe you'll like it (or appreciate it for that matter) more than De-Loused.

And now for a bonus: A quick rating of each song on the CD.

1. Cygnus...Vismund Cygnus - 9.1/10

2. The Widow - 8.2/10

3. L' Via L' Viaquez - 9.4/10

4. Miranda That Ghost Just Isn't Holy Anymore - 8.9/10

5. Cassandra Gemini - 9.9/10

No review will ever do justice to this album. After reviewing what i've typed out, I feel like i've done the album somewhat of an injustice for failing to give it a worthy review. Instead of wasting your time reading my garbage, go buy the damn album already!