Frances the Mute

Frances the Mute is the second studio album by American progressive rock band The Mars Volta released in February 2005 on Gold Standard Laboratories and Universal. Produced by guitarist and songwriter Omar Rodriguez-Lopez, the album incorporates dub, ambient, Latin and jazz influences, and is the first to feature bassist Juan Alderete and percussionist Marcel Rodriguez-Lopez. The album also includes contributions from future saxophonist Adrián Terrazas-González, who joined the band during its subsequent tour.

Frances the Mute made multiple "Best of" lists at the end of 2005.^{[citation needed]} In the Q & Mojo magazine Classic Special Edition Pink Floyd & The Story of Prog Rock, the album came No. 18 in its list of "40 Cosmic Rock Albums" and was also named as one of Classic Rock magazine's 10 essential progressive rock albums of the decade.

Jeremy Ward, audio artist for The Mars Volta until his death, had previously worked as a repo man. One day, Ward discovered a diary in the backseat of a car he was repossessing, and began to note the similarities between his life and that of the author—most notably, that they had both been adopted. The diary told of the author's search for his biological parents, with the way being pointed by a collection of people, their names being the basis for each named track of Frances the Mute.

Some of the material which would end up on Frances the Mute, including "The Widow" and "Miranda That Ghost Just Isn't Holy Anymore", pre-dated De-Loused in the Comatorium, having been originally demoed by Omar Rodríguez-López in the early days of The Mars Volta. While touring in support of De-Loused, the band would incorporate more and more extended improvisational sections into some of their songs, often trying out new ideas. Parts of "Cygnus....Vismund Cygnus" ("Facilis Descenus Averni" and "Con Safo") were first performed live in the middle of "Drunkship of Lanterns" (as heard on Live EP) and "Take the Veil Cerpin Taxt" respectively, while parts of "Cassandra Gemini" originated from improvisations during "Cicatriz ESP" (as heard on Scabdates). The album was initially to be titled Sarcophagus.

Rodríguez-López arranged and produced the recording sessions himself. Unlike De-Loused in the Comatorium, which was recorded in producer Rick Rubin's mansion, sessions for the new album took place in multiple studios, with most tracking done in what Rodríguez-López described as "a shithole… Basically a warehouse with one little air conditioner on its last legs, awful wiring and a console you couldn’t rely on". Rather than bring his ideas to the band as a whole and working them out at group rehearsals, he met individually with each player to practice each part one-on-one. "We'll sit there and play it forever and slow—real slow—to understand what's happening. It's easy to play something fast and loud, but to play it soft and slow takes a certain amount of discipline. Then once we understand the part, everyone's free to elaborate—their personalities come out and it's not my part anymore; they get into and give it that swing that I can't give it." Rodríguez-López took the additional step of recording the band member separately before layering the various tracks to create each song. Drummer Jon Theodore was the first to record his parts, and he spent time arranging and mapping out the songs with Omar and in the process figuring out what the rhythmic structures would be stated on the recording process. "This is the first time I've ever been so methodical about recording. Normally I would go into the situation with as good an idea as I could, whether that was from performing the songs on tour or having a general road map. But this was the first instance where I considered every single hit all the way through, every figure up to and including every change. There were no question marks. So when I was tracking with the metronome it was just a question of right or wrong." An exception to this recording method was the middle section of "Cassandra Gemini", edited from a lengthy jam session.

Tracking this way had a mixed reception in the band; Theodore and bassist Juan Alderete responded well to the individualistic approach while keyboard player Isaiah "Ikey" Owens didn't like it at all. However, as Rodríguez-López stated, "People filling in ideas can become tedious and counterproductive. You find yourself working backwards. When you're in the studio 'what ifs' are your biggest enemy, so my general rule is, if it's something you can't live with—if a sentence begins with 'I can't' or 'I will not'—then we examine it. But if it's 'maybe we should' or 'I think that' then it's like, hey man, full steam ahead. Not that there isn't a lot of refinement to what we do—obviously there is— but I consider it a balance of raw energy and refinement."

Frances the Mute featured the largest array of guest musicians on any Mars Volta album to date. Flea, who played bass on De-Loused in the Comatorium, this time contributed trumpet to "The Widow" and "Miranda...". "L'Via L'Viaquez" featured guitar solos from John Frusciante as well as piano solos by Omar's childhood hero, salsa pianist Larry Harlow. Rodríguez-López described the session with Harlow in Puerto Rico as "a childhood dream come true". "Cassandra Gemini" featured flute and saxophone contributions from Mexican woodwind player Adrián Terrazas-González, who would join the band full time for the subsequent tour. All the tracks also included full string and horn sections, arranged by David Campbell with the help of Rodríguez-López. According to Cedric Bixler-Zavala, while recording a section in "Cassandra Gemini" one of the orchestra members played so hard that he broke his antique bow: "And you could see his ‘classical’ side come out – like, ‘I broke this playing a fuckin’ rock song??’ He was pissed off. But I was like, ‘Fuck yeah, man, that’s on the record! You’ve got to realise things like that are cool.’”

In 2012, Juan Alderete noted that Frances the Mute is the studio album he is most proud of.