[dropcap]S[/dropcap]ome politician once said, “You either die a hero, or you live long enough to see yourself become the villain” (ok, it was Harvey Dent in The Dark Knight). Flip that around and the quote could be the ideal allusion to Greg Dulli, who completes the 2012 return of the soul inflected alt-rock favorites Afghan Whigs with their first studio album in 16 years, Do to the Beast, out April 15 on Sub Pop Records.
During the band’s apex in the mid-’90s, Dulli was both reviled and lauded for his unchecked lyrical honesty that fiercely bounded about the spectrum of the male psyche from out of control male egotism to heartfelt anguish at the failures of co-dependence that he put squarely on himself. One minute Dulli could drop lines like, “She wants love/And I just want to fuck” while a few songs later profess things like “Slave I only use as a word to describe/The way I feel when I’m with you.”
The paradoxical nature of the verses was bewildering; men were pissed because Dulli was revealing their desperate to be hidden insincerity. Women were pissed at his misogynistic tendencies, which confirmed what they suspected all along. But the anomalistic confessions had some dudes admiring Dulli to express themselves in ways they could never dream while chicks were disarmed and attracted to the elements of insecurity and admitted self-loathe.
And while Dulli never went away, he’s been busy with a multitude of projects from the Twilight Singers to a team-up with another tortured spirit in Mark Lanegan as the appropriately named Gutter Twins, bringing back the Afghan Whigs is sure to lead to some renewed uneasiness across the panorama. “Picture where I’ve been/Underneath within/I could love you/I could steal your light,” from a new song, “I Am Fire,” is just a sampling.
So which is it; is Greg Dulli a villain or a hero?
We want to know what you think, and why. Shoot an e-mail to me at mchristopher@vanyaland.com with your most debonair answer with the rationale behind it and you’ll be entered to win something pretty sick: a white label vinyl test pressing of Do To The Beast. There were only 50 printed, and we’ve got one.
The contest ends Saturday, April 5 at noon. And if you don’t win, don’t fret, Sub Pop is taking pre-orders for a double vinyl, 45 RPM edition of the album. Buy it now and you can stream it instantly, well ahead of the release date.
