In 1993 The Afghan Whigs had a hit with Gentlemen, the frank and somewhat frightening triptych through the desolation of a relationship, based on true events in the life of Greg Dulli, the singer and leader of the band. It was venomous, it was vulnerable, it was bravely candid. The line "I've got a dick for a brain and my brain will sell my ass to you" followed Dulli around for awhile in the press. Some called it honest, some called it misogynistic. You have to keep in mind, this was the early nineties, when Alternative navel gazing was the order of the day. The Whigs waving their dicks around like that then was pretty brazen. Not to mention that sonically, they were an onslaught of groove in the age of sludge.
It's perhaps ironic they probably wouldn't have gotten signed to a major label or gotten Gentlemen anywhere on the Billboard chart without Mtv airplay, their video was aired on 120 Minutes, which existed because of the Alternative movement. True for lots of very disparate artists.
So Black Love was the followup album, and where the previous album was intensely personal, this one was a crime novel set to music. The album sounds like Film Noir looks, and is cast full of strings and bombast. Check it out here.
