Bearing in mind that I have not heard the entire album, I definitely don't get "nu-metal" out of what I've heard of it, but it also doesn't resemble the entity that was Jane's Addiction, either. That's what most people's problems with it are - it does not reflect a direct lineage from the Jane's Addiction sound. That's a legitimate beef. The issue lies with Dave Navarro, from what I can tell, whose style has drastically changed from the sparse, economic playing he displayed on the first three albums. Now he's just another (good) guitar player, where before he had a truly distinct voice. I also don't get the feeling that the hearts of the band, in general, are really in this.

For a great post-Jane's album, I highly recommend Navarro's project with Eric Avery, Deconstruction. They only did the one album, but it was pretty cool, and is vastly better than Dave's solo recent solo album.

Interesting that people are complaining about album covers. I mean, what does an album cover have to do with the music? I remember the discussion we had in the Iron Maiden thread about this. Judging music by its cover is like judging a book by its cover.

I recently purchased Jane Says from a download service. 99 cents! I've done my part, RIAA (gives them the #1 sign)

I wasn't "complaining"... I was "observing". There is a big difference.

Second, album artwork IS important. Sure, you can't judge the music by it's self by the artwork, but it does weigh into the entire package. There is a reason the word "art" is in the phrase "album artwork".

TDavid, you're absolutely right about cover artwork meaning essentially nothing . . . and yet it does. I picked up the new Iron Maiden and while I like it, it's still another album of them rehashing older songs (to the point of lifting riffs right out of older tracks - they also did this on their previous album, Brave New World.) It's enjoyable, but something key is missing. I just get the feeling that the band is doing what they can to take advantage of an opening their music has in the industry right now - nostalgia for 80s metal is reaching it's peak right now. They're kind of playing to that. How does the artwork question fit into this? It reflects an attitude about what they've put into the music. That Iron Maiden, in this specific case (because I can't speak authoritatively about Jane's,) would choose to go with such blatantly awful artwork - it just is, there is no way around it - shows that there's a different attitude going on behind the music. This isn't as "for the real fans" as they might have you believe. It feels like posturing for the sake of more sales because people like to see that "we don't give a damn" attitude. Something's not genuine here. I just can't put a finger on what it is yet.

Jane's Addiction and Iron Maiden in the same thread . . . who'da thunk it possible?

The Theory - My use of the description "people" was a generalization used primarily for the Iron Maiden thread and the forum that went on and on about their new album.

Also since in this article you comment about the cover art with some detail so it reminded me of this other thread and that's the correlation. I wasn't saying you were complaining, so if you took that personal it wasn't intended that way. If I'm going to be critical of anybody, yourself included, rest assured that I'll not be vague, The Theory. I'll address one by their name directly.

At least with Iron Maiden I can understand a bit about the disappointment over the new cover because those Eddie drawings are pretty intricate, but I'm not buying any of this "the cover matters" stuff with Jane's Addiction. The cover has zero to do with my music buying decision with any band and if others are using this as a measure of whether a CD sucks or not? I don't get it. That's just me, though.

Honestly, I can't even tell you what the cover looks like to most of the CDs I've bought recently because once bought they get burned to mp3 and played from my computer.

Obviously some other fans feel differently out there.

I really have to agree with The Theory on this one. Album artwork can sometimes turn a good album into a great one. Specifically coming to my mind is Sufjan Steven's release Welcome to Michigan. This really applies heaviest to concept albums, however cheesy artwork can more or less ruin an album... to an extent.

frost@work - I'll grant you that when music still came out in album-sized packaging the artwork was more significant and concept "albums" are an excellent example.

The overall desirability of the package as a whole, yes, sure it matters, but the music is notes, sounds, not ink on paper. It's something important from a collector's point of view for valuation purposes, but musically it doesn't matter.