The Metro was packed Sunday night for one of the seminal bands of the alternative scene in the late 80s, Jane’s Addiction.  The review from the Sun Times Thomas Conner is HERE.  Sounds like it was a hell of a show; not at all merely a nostalgia act 15 years past it’s expiration date, but a band that still has the ferocity and imagination of its youth.

The band’s first album in 8 years (Strays came out 8 years AGO!!!  Hard to believe!), drops Sept 27th.

Here’s a write-up of a recent listening party from Billboard Magazine:   Two dozen people crammed into the Burbank, Calif., recording studio where Jane’s Addiction spent most of 2011 to listen to their fourth studio effort, “The Great Escape Artist,” on Thursday evening. Played loud but not deafening on PMC equipment that included two six-foot-tall speakers, producer Rich Costey introduced the evening by saying the album got its “sea legs” with bassist Duff McKagan, who departed and was replaced by Dave Sitek (producer and TV on the Radio member). Three tracks written with McKagan — “Broken People,” “Words Right Out of My Mouth,” “Ultimate Reason” — are on the album.

Costey said Sitek provided a kick in the pants to the band and it shows in terms of their sound gaining greater density throughout the 10-song, 40-minute album. “End to the Lies” and “Ultimate Reason” hew closest to the standard Jane’s Addiction sound, but they venture into harder-edged rock  (“Words Right Out of My Mouth” and “Twisted Tales”), U2-inspired melody and chiming guitars (“Broken People”) and a track driven by fat and echoey Dave Navarro guitar riffs that would make a great James Bond theme (“I’ll Hit You Back”).

While Eldorado Recording Studios is in different location than when the first two Jane’s Addiction albums were recorded, much of the equipment remains the same, including the mixing board. Very much a studio effort, while songs were being written in one room, recording was taking place in another, according to manager Peter Katsis of Prospect Park Management.

The listening session, with Katsis, Costey, about 10 journalists, a few representatives from Capitol/EMI and publicity firm MSO’s Mitch Schneider and Alexandra Greenberg, was a bit of a top-secret affair — all cell phones were off during the playback and no one dared take any pictures.

READ MORE HERE

Source:  http://www.billboard.com/news/inside-the-listening-party-jane-s-addiction-1005345212.story

Check this vid of one of the new singles performed live in Chile: