Enter the Chicken

With <i>Enter the Chicken</i> Buckethead goes accessible—for him, anyway. Every incarnation of the Bucketed One appears here: guitar-shredder supreme, avant-garde noodler, demented circus clown. He even sings on a few tracks. The album is as schizophrenic as its creator, ranging from the heavy metal assault of “Botnus” to the (dare we say it) radio-friendly “Running From the Light” and “Waiting Hare,” the latter featuring the vocals of Serj Tankian of System of a Down who also produced the CD. He gets further help from metal screecher Efrem Shulz, Azam Ali of Vas, and, on “Three Fingers,” MC Saul Williams, who deadpan raps over a funk metal groove. Buckethead’s bizarre and irreverent sense of humor is also on display in such songs as “Funbus,” a campy, death metal shot at artists (and listeners) who take themselves too seriously. He does fire off a few of the lightning-speed solos for which he is revered in certain circles, but the emphasis is on the compositions and overall flow of the songs. He may be eclectic, but on <i>Enter the Chicken</i>, he also manages to be focused.