*1/2 Perry Farrell

REV

(Warner Bros.)

It's a bit sad, really, that all Perry Farrell can come up with to bid adieu to a decade he personally had such an enormous impact on is this tossed-together collection of Jane's Addiction and Porno for Pyros highlights with only a measly two new recordings tacked on for good measure. It's been a good two years since the last Porno disc, and it's not as if Lollapalooza had been taking up too much of his time of late. But what Farrell has to offer right now is nothing more than a single featuring one new Jane's-ish tune ("Rev") recorded with the help of long-time Farrell guy Stephen Perkins on drums, Rage Against the Machine guitarist Tom Morello, and Red Hot Chili Peppers guitarist John Frusciante -- the A-side, if you will -- and a pretty damn limp techno reinterpretation of the Led Zeppelin classic "Whole Lotta Love" -- which is so half-baked, it's barely worth calling a B-side.

The 14 other tracks do offer a solid greatest-hits Farrell overview from the past decade, with little in the way of surprises unless you count the 12-inch remix of "Been Caught Stealing" or Porno for Pyros' Cable Guy cover of Lou Reed's "Satellite of Love" as rare cuts, and they hardly are. Rev is a reminder that alternative rock as we've known it might not have been possible without Jane's Addiction's having first bridged the gap between mainstream metal and underground post-punk. And it's hard to imagine the '90s without the Lollapalooza that Farrell more or less facilitated. But who would have thought he'd be reduced to milking past glories so soon?

-- Matt Ashare