Early '90s Month: Eleven

ELEVEN
"AWAKE IN A DREAM"
(Morgan Creek, 1991)


"Water And Power"


As with a few of the other CDs I've been profiling this month, I bought Eleven's debut album without hearing a note of their music in advance ... and I can say that I'm glad it happened that way, because I might have avoided them otherwise and missed out on some great music. In their later albums, Eleven have ventured further toward hard rock and metal, a significantly heavier sound than I normally care for; which makes them one of the "anomalies" in my CD collection.

Eleven's debut album, however, is a much more accessible affair, full of hook-packed, boisterous, stompy fun ... about as "pop" as hard rock (and I use the word "hard" loosely in this case) can get. What is perhaps Eleven's trademark is the fact that there's usually a guitar singing in unison right along with the alternating lead vocals of Alain Johannes and Natasha Shneider, both of whom have very unique voices in their own right. The important thing is not to pigeonhole Eleven too quickly; when a band cites its influences as ranging from Led Zeppelin to Johann Sebastian Bach, how can you?

Eleven's drummer, Jack Irons (except during their 2000 album, "Avantgardedog", when Greg Upchurch filled in), has been part of the Red Hot Chili Peppers and also Pearl Jam. When not recording as Eleven, Johannes and Shneider find themselves with steady work as producers and songwriters, having worked with artists such as Chris Cornell, No Doubt, and UK rockers Steadman.