60 Songs That Explain the '90s - The Darkness — “I Believe in a Thing Called Love”

Episode Date: March 4, 2026

There is a select handful of people who were never meant to step foot into an office due to their proclivity to screw around. Just like we sent Rob packing to Ohio to bother no one but himself, Lowestoft, England shipped us The Darkness. During the post-grunge era when rock was murkily defined, we were gifted front man and lead singer Justin Hawkins on a silver platter (his manager’s shoulders) to give us crude operatic hair metal ballads. This week, Rob discusses, “I Believe in a Thing Called Love,” a song that proves if you dive head first into cheesiness, it becomes ironic and cool. Later, he is joined by Jill Hopkins who talks about the experience of watching The Darkness live and then comparing that to the people who feel confident enough to sing The Darkness at karaoke. Host: Rob Harvilla Producers: Justin Sayles and Olivia Crerie Additional Video Editing: Kevin Pooler Guest: Jill Hopkins Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

I have not worked in an office in 13 years. I work exclusively at home, in near total isolation and in sweatpants, mumbling to myself and enjoying very little in-person social contact outside of my immediate family. And that's all very much for the best. I am isolated for my own protection and for the protection of others. Why did I stop working in an office, you ask? Oh, various reasons. Various noble and ignoble reasons.

One ignoble reason I started working exclusively at home is that one time at my last office job, I was reprimanded by HR for emailing everyone in our office the YouTube link to an Aerosmith video. Let me answer your first question. Yeah, whatever Aerosmith video you were thinking of, I didn't send that one. Wasn't loving an elevator or crazy or pink or dude looks like a lady. No, I emailed all my coworkers the video for Angel. An electrifying power ballad off the 1987 Aerosmith comeback album, Permanent Vacation, Angel, a relative,

wholesome, chaste, soaring, transcendent, majestic, piano-driven power ballad. Frontman Stephen Tyler is not actually singing while stranded on the surface of the moon. That is a state-of-the-art in 1987's special effect. Yeah, it's 2012 or so, and I'm wearing jeans and working in the San Francisco office of a music streaming service that got totally obliterated by the existence of Spotify. It's a tough break. I was the managing editor, which is not a real job title at a technology company. Or anyway, it's not a job title. My coworkers are obligated to respect managing editor. Can't even manage not to get yelled at by HR. So I'm sitting in the office one day, and I'm trying to

give away two tickets to see Aerosmith live at Oracle Arena in Oakland, California. And so I fire up a jaunty little email, and I see-see everybody, and I'm like, hey, who wants to go see Aerosmith? I got two tickets to paradise. Maybe they'll play the greatest power ballad in rock and roll history. And I throw in the YouTube link to Angel because this song Whips Ass. I didn't say it whips ass in the email. That would be unprofessional. I'm not an idiot, but I love Angel very much.

The incendiary guitar action punctuating every word right there I want you love I do believe Aerosmith lead guitarist Joe Perry is windmilling those righteous power chords while standing in the middle of a real-life desert highway I believe that part of the angel video

was filmed on the location Don't make it tough I throw away my pride The yearning, virile, super 80s grandeur of this pre-chorus, man. I caught Angel at random on MTV when I was nine years old, and it was the best song I'd ever heard in my life. And it felt like MTV would never play Angel again. This is a deep cut relatively.

They kept playing dude, parenthesis, looks like a lady, close parenthesis instead. And so I sat there every day with our VIII. VCR turned on and a blank VHS tape queued up so I could tape the Angel video if it ever came on again. And the day I got it, the day Angel came back on MTV and I leapt off my couch and I hurtled our coffee table and I mashed the record button like five seconds into the video. That was the greatest day of my life up to that point. It's like I won the Super Bowl. Enough's enough. I've suffered and I've seen the lie. Can you blame me, really, for wanting to share some modest portion of my joy with my coworkers

at this doomed streaming service? No, you can't blame me. Chorus! Fun fact, five years later in 1992, the angel in the angel video played the Ghost of Christmas passed in the Muppet Christmas Carol. That's not true. Unbelievable song, fantastic song. So I CC the whole office and I say, how do you do, fellow important co-workers? Who wants to go see Arrowsmith? Check out this rad video. I have a real job. And I get pretty much no reply for several hours. And then I get an email from HR. And I don't remember exactly what the email said, but it was words to the effect of knock it off. Right? Right. I might have actually gotten an email from our lawyer who like all my coworkers had way better things to do. And she's very polite

and diplomatic, but she's like, please don't email everyone here anything like that ever again. And I'm like, oh, shit. And I go back and I rewatch the whole angel video at my desk, at work. And now I'm worried that there's an orgy in it or something, but there isn't. The spiciest moment I can find in this video is honestly a quite tasteful silhouette of a foxy lady undulating behind a large billowing sheet. The foxy lady is maybe probably mostly naked and Stephen Tyler's on the street in a trench coat and okay, I see the problem now. All right, that's my bad dudes. I'm sorry I emailed that to everyone. That's not how a managing editor should behave. I maybe shouldn't work in an office anymore. I should probably move back to Ohio and never go anywhere or talk to anyone

again, pretty much. Look, I'm not at my best in 2012. You know what I'm at my best? Back in the 80s, when I just sat around all day watching rad hair metal videos on MTV. I am confident that you can hear this guy's mullet, even if you are not partaking in the video version of this podcast. Business up front, party in the back does not suffice to describe the gargantuan voluminousness of this guy's mullet. A Fortune 500 company in the front, a Jay Gatsby party in the back. No, that's dumb. This man's hair is large, biblically large. Now it is 1988, and I am 10 years old, and I have just seen the face and the hair of God

in a Striper video. Striper the venerated Southern California Christian metal band This song is called I Believe in You And it is an even more wholesome chase, soaring, transcendent, majestic, piano-driven 80s hair metal power ballad The way Striper frontman Michael Sweet points emphatically

when he hits that last note In my heart you'll stay That's how you know this chorus is going to biblically whip ass From their 1988 album, In God we trust, this is I believe in you. Striper is a literally biblical name. Isaiah chapter 53, verse 5, King James Version. Quote, but he was wounded for our transgressions. He was bruised for our iniquities.

The chastisement of our peace was upon him, and with his stripes, we are healed. End quote. Striper with a Y. S-T-R-Y-P-E-R. It's cooler with a Y. why. Get a load of these drums. That's Michael Sweet's brother, Robert Sweet's, on drums. Metal bands are cooler if there's brothers in them. I saw the I Believe in You video on MTV when I was 10 years old and I was mesmerized. I am mesmerized by those righteous power chords.

I am mesmerized by Robert Sweet's drum kit with all the symbols hung from chains overhead. I don't know if that sounds good from a drum tech perspective, but it looks cool as hell. I'm mesmerized by the string section of tastefully dressed foxy ladies playing see-through violins and whatnot. And I'm mesmerized as Michael Sweet keeps hitting notes higher than the towering peaks of Mount Sinai. Striper's famous black and yellow color scheme. Also, extremely cool, extremely metal. Would it shock you to learn that this song, I believe in you, has a key change? Would it shock you to learn that this song peaks with Michael Sweet hitting an even higher note? I suspect this does not shock you at all. The Striper awesome mullet guy is singing way too hard to point this time. It's not a true

classic hair metal song if it doesn't have at least one note that would physically kill you if you attempted to sing it. But what's that? Oh, you don't like piano-driven hair metal power ballads? Okay, that's fine. I respect that. Let me ask you something. Do you know a second song by the rock band Europe?

You 100% know at least one song by the rock band Europe. They're from Sweden. You know the final countdown, right? That one. Sorry, I had to do the whole thing. It felt rude not to do the whole thing. But do you know another Europe song? Because I know three.

I know the final countdown. I know let the good times rock. And I know this one. I know Open Your Heart from the 1984 Europe album Wings of Tomorrow. Open Your Heart is a power ballad. And Europe's keyboard player is prominently involved. But this tune is not piano-driven per se. Instead, it's driven by the part where the guitar player physically throws his acoustic guitar off screen and switches to electric guitar and starts whipping ass.

I don't think I got to tell you how psyched I was sitting on my couch. The first time I watched Europe's guitar player go thoop and then go burr, I picked up our coffee table and I threw it at the ceiling. MTV used to play this stuff all the time. MTV used to be all hair metal all the time, all majestic power ballads all the time, all mullets all the time. Now, that's not true, technically, factually, but that's what it felt like to me. It was all mullets to me emotionally. When I was 10 years old, MTV was the whole world to me. And to me, this was MTV's whole world.

Righteous power chords, glass pianos. spandex, medium to severe lewdness and magnificent plumage. You wouldn't call this sort of thing critically acclaimed or even especially cool. But by the mid-80s, hair metal was ridiculously huge. And yeah, never mind. It was incredibly cool. And it did indisputably define the first decade plus of my life. I'll put it to you like this. I heard Black Flag the King's X song way,

before I ever heard Black Flag the punk rock band. Yes, in high school, in the mid-90s, the first several times somebody cool mentioned Black Flag, the band. I just naturally assumed they were referring to Black Flag, the song by King's X, a hair metal adjacent trio from Springfield, Missouri. Holy crap, I had no idea these dudes lived in Missouri. I thought all the cool metal bands lived in California or yours. I lived in Missouri for most of the first decade of my life.

I lived in Eureka, Missouri, near Six Flags, and also near a Superfund site. And no offense, but I can assure you, Missouri was not this cool. And yet here is King's X. Here is King's X frontman Doug Pinnock, the coolest guy named Doug who ever lived. Doug is rocking a more Mohawk-based sort of magnificent plumage. And Doug is starring in a weird, cool, unsettling rock video that features awesome state-of-the-art in 1992 special effects. The Black Flag video walked so the Black Whole Sun video could run. Meanwhile, Doug is hitting a climactic high note that would kill me if I attempted

it. Yes, I said 1992. You heard me correctly. Black Flag by King's X came out in 1992 and got played a lot on MTV in 1992. Now, you may have also heard me say, dozens, if not hundreds of times, that hair metal did not exist in 1992. What's that dumb, a historical, wildly exaggerated, cliched statement I'm always making? Ah, yes, grunge-killed hair metal. That's what I always say. In September 1991, the very first time Nirvana smells like teen spirit video appears, on MTV within five seconds. Burn and a tch-tick-d-d-burn-hatter. Hair metal is dead.

Five seconds. The smells like teen spirit video premieres and hair metal spontaneously combusts. Hair metal chokes on someone else's vomit. Hair metal dies in a bizarre gardening accident. But that's not true. And that's giving grunge way too much credit for existing. And I'm giving hair metal nowhere near enough credit for surviving.

Yes, in the early 90s and beyond, the likes of poison and White Snake and Cinderella and Warrant and Winger and whatnot enjoyed markedly less commercial success and media attention and critical acclaim compared to Nirvana and Pearl Jam and Soundgarden and so forth. But plenty of early 90s hard rock did not qualify as alternative rock at all. You know what video played on MTV constantly in 1992? Everything About You, By Ugly Kid Joe. Ugly Kid Joe are from Sweden. That's not true. They're from Southern California. The Everything About You video takes place on the beach,

the lush cinematography, the righteous headbanging, the disconcertingly handsome lead singer. Think of this. the Temple of the Dog hunger strike video for dickheads. I don't even mean that ugly. Dickheads complimentary. Dickheads is the ugly kid Joe vibe on purpose. These dudes had another big hit in 92 with a weirdly awesome dead serious cover of Cats in the Cradle, the 1974 Harry Chapin' Weepy Folk, lousy father anthem Cats in the Cradle. My boy was just like me, but like listen to every about you again sometime. It's got rude, scrappy, punk-adjacent energy. It's got a grunge crunch

to it. It's got a disquieting red hot chili peppers style funk metal breakdown. Well, I know, you know, everybody know. You can talk yourself into Ugly Kid Joe as Lalapalooza material. Yes, they maybe are alternative. Yes, but no. Everything about you is a hair metal song. In sound and vision and temperament. For one thing, in the video, they're flying what appears to be a sex doll kite on the beach. That is hair metal ass behavior. For another thing, Ugly Kid Joe's frontman sounds an awful lot like David Lee Roth also on purpose. That hate everything about is Primo David Lee Roth. That's Primo Classic Van Halen. Shout out Van Halen. Metal band. are cooler with brothers in them.

The early 90s was not all Nirvana all the time. Alternative rock was not the only kind of rock. All sorts of additional non-alternative flavors of rock back then. Plenty of impressively quaffed and manscaped

dudes, bellowing, chased, soaring, transcendent, majestic, acoustic guitar-driven hair metal power ballads. And if you don't believe me, then love is on the way is on the way. is on the way from their

1992 album The Lizard here we have Saigon Kick with Love is on the way I feel bad for Saigon Kick's drummer because his band's biggest hit has basically no drums in it so in the video they just hand him mallets

and one drum so we can go periodically here play with this. Saigon Kick aha they must be from Florida Saigon Kick or from Coral Springs, Florida. Please don't tell me why they name themselves that.

No thank you. Also, the Japanese version of this album, The Lizard, includes Saigon Kicks' cover of Deer Prudence by the Beatles. Also, no thank you. Moving on to 1993. Oh, look who it is.

Yes, it's Aerosmith with Living on the Edge. The lead single off their 1993 album, Get a Grip. If you saw a brief shot of Stephen Tyler writhing around with half his body painted black, just forget you saw that. Also, you can't tell in that clip, but he's naked. Just forget I told you that. It's not safe for work.

Get a Grip is the Aerosmith album with Cryin Amazing and Crazy on it, the Elysia Silverstone Video trilogy, the Godfather trilogy of its time. Aerosmith are absolutely nobody's idea of an alternative rock band, and yet Aerosmith are absolutely thriving on. 1990s MTV. Does the name Budnick mean anything to you? Bobby Budnick? The Dickhead bully from the early 90s Nickelodeon summer camp

sitcom, Salute Your Shorts, the Redhead Mullet Kid, who was also in Terminator 2. He looked like Muppet Baby's Axel Rose. This actor's name is Danny Cooksey. Did you know that Danny was also the front man for a rough,

tough, mean hair metal band? called Bad for Good. I overuse the Muppet Babies as a reference point, but this kid really does look like Muppet Babies Axel Rose. He looks like Super Mario Kart Axel Rose. That's Bad for Good, Bad Numeral For Good, all one word. And I personally am totally convinced that Budnick is rough, tough, mean, bad, and 19. I believe at least 20% of those things.

That's rude. I'm sorry. I really like this song. 19 is a cover of a Phil Linnat song, the great Phil Linnat from Thin Lizzie, coolest guy named Phil ever. And look, given the choice between a hair metal song about how the singer is 19

and a hair metal song about how the singer's girlfriend is 17, I will always enthusiastically take this. Yes? Incredibly, Bud Nick is my second favorite member of Bad for Good, whose lead guitarist is named Thomas McRocklin. Thomas McRoclin. Not Tommy McRoclin.

Not even Tom McRoclin. I am smitten by both the formality and the flagrant informality of Thomas McRoclin. Oh, he must be Irish. All of these songs I got from this incredible 2013 Spin Magazine list called No Alternative. 40 hard rock songs that Nirvana couldn't kill. I was working at Spin at the time.

I worked there for like 10 minutes total. It's not my fault. Not an office job and not my fault. But I got to write a few blurbs for this phenomenal list of non-alternative early 90s rock songs that my brilliant co-workers put together. Chuck Eddie, the amazing rock critic, an editor and author of Stairway to Hell,

the 500 best heavy metal albums in the universe. Chuck was a driving force on this list, and I was delighted just to be along for the ride. This list is not really online. The slideshow doesn't work now. It's not my fault. But I emailed my old spin colleague Christopher R. Weingarten, and I'm like, do you remember this 90s hard rock song list we did? Do you have it saved anywhere?

And Chris writes back immediately. And he says, yeah, I found it by searching my email for Jackal. For you audio-only consumers, your ears do not deceive you. That was a chainsaw solo. That was a chainsaw chorus, actually, to a 1992 hit song called The Lumberjack. Jackal hail from the suburbs of Atlanta, Georgia. Jackal are on Geffen Records, which means Jackal and Nirvana are labelmates. Sure.

That's Jackal with a Y. J-A-C-Y-L. It's way cooler with a Y. As Striper taught us, any hair metal band name is cooler with a Y. Let me break this down for you. You know what's not cool? A hair metal band named Dentist. What?

The dentist. No, I don't want to listen. Those guys sound terrible. You know what's cool? A hair metal band named Dentist, D-E-N-T-Y-S-T. Ooh, they replaced the eye with a Y. That's super tough. I'm intrigued.

You know, it's incredibly cool? A hair metal band named Dentist, D-Y-N-T-Y-S-T. Oh, shit. They replaced both the E and the I with Y's. That is rough and tough and metal as hell. I loved that spin list so much. 40 hard rock saws that Nirvana couldn't kill. The alternative to the alternative.

Rad saws by warrant, slaughter, ACDC, Motorhead. extreme, deaf leopard, Queens Reich, etc. That's Queensreich with a Y. And there's an oomelout over the Y. Holy shit. The list was ranked, I believe. And so, you know, the number one,

the very best early 90s, hard rock song Nirvana couldn't kill. That would be November rain by Guns and Roses, led by Axel Rose, real life, full-size, non-super Mario Kart, Axel Rose. Yes, November rain is the correct choice for the number one non-Nirvana early 90s rock song. Yes, of course.

However, I was there. I was there sitting in a sold-out movie theater in the suburbs of Cleveland, Ohio, on Friday, February 14th, 1992, Valentine's Day. I might have actually been on a junior high date scare quotes with a young lady who, as it turns, that was just not that end to me. Good for her. It's a good call. I was there for opening night of the best movie I'd ever seen in my life, and I found out that the best non-Nirvana hard rock song of the early 90s might have actually come out in 1975. I think we'll go with a little Bohemian Rhapsody, gentlemen. Good call. The Wayne's World movie. Directed by Penelope Sphiris. Penelope is the

best. Wayne's World, opening night, the Bohemian Rhapsody scene. Bohemian Rhapsody by Queen. Yes. Wayne's World is set in present-day Aurora, Illinois. And a subtle joke amid all the phenomenal, unsubtle jokes here, is that early 90s cable access TV era Aurora, Illinois, looks like and is basically still fully living in the 70s. The second best song in this movie is Wayne. Girlfriend's Band's cover of Ballroom Blitz, a song originally released by the glam rock band Suite in 1974. Great song, great cover in this movie. Shout out Tia Carrera.

Shout out crucial taunt. Wayne's about to swing by a rock club where Meatloaf, the 70s and 90s rock star Meatloaf, he plays the bouncer. Who's playing? The shitty Beatles. Are they any good? They suck. I love every last seconds.

of the Wayne's World movie so much in all this movie's super 70s glory. No stairway denied but nothing compares to the Bohemian Rhapsody scene. I see a little silhouette of a man. Got a moosh, gotta moosh will you do the fandango? Thunderballs and lightning very very frightening. Galileo. Galileo! Galileo, Bigot-a-Loh.

It's the dudes in the back. backseat. Wayne's best friend Garth is driving. Wayne's riding shotgun. It's their movie, but this scene's not the same without the two long hair burnout dumbasses in the backseat in all their 90s via 70s hair metal glory. The guy in the back on the left is about to operatically raise both his hands and roll his eyes skyward as he sings, Mama me, let me go. And I will never forget the glorious, joyful, goofy look on this dude's face for as long as I live. There's another guy in the backseat now, the drunk guy in the middle who's singing along, but he's also maybe going to hurl, an absolute bedlam in my movie theater in suburban Cleveland on Valentine's

Day, 1992, when the Bohemian Rhapsody scene hit, screaming laughter, total chaos, unremitting joy. It was the Minecraft movie of its day. This is unequivocally my all-time greatest movie theater memory. This scene. We come to this place for magic, et cetera, and to this day I'm curious. This is 1992. We are 90s teenagers. To be clear, Queen's. are eternally cool, queen are eternally huge, queen do not require redemption or rediscovery. Bohemian Rhapsody is not a deep cut that this movie is shrewdly excavating. But Bohemian Rhapsody blaring in a roomful of 90s teenagers, this is not our song. This is not our time.

This is not our generation. This is not alternative rock. This song is pure uncut 19-70. This song is our parents in song form. And here on Valentine's Day, 1992, we love this scene immediately and permanently. And Bohemian Rhapsody is suddenly present tense again. In 1976, the song peaked at number nine on the Billboard Hot 100. After the Wayne's World movie, Bohemian Rhapsody re-entered the charts, and now it peaks at number two.

beaten out only by Jump Jump by Chris Cross. I'll allow it. The Wayne's World Bump. It's delightful. Did you know that the sequel, Wains World 2, came out just a year and a half later in late 1993? That's efficiency. You know what happens at the end of Wainsworld 2?

An Aerosmith concert. Look who it is. But yeah, to this day, I'm curious. Thinking about that packed, joyful theater full of 90s teenagers. How well did we know Queen and know Bohemian Rhapsody before Wayne's World? How well did I know this song? Is it Bohemian Rhapsody specifically and exclusively that has this timeless teenager delighting time warp ability? Or does all ridiculous operatic 70s glam rock carry this potential? Because I feel like all my life, long before Wayne's World and long after,

ostensibly new rock bands have been actively trying to teleport us all back to the 70s. And the farther away we all got from the actual 70s, the harder those bands tried. And look, nothing else is Bohemian Rhapsody. Nobody else is Queen, except no substitutes. However, the little guitar shutter there, the vibrato, the dur-da-w-dur-dur-d-d-n-d-it. Within six seconds, this song is an all-timer. My name is Rob Harvilla. This is the 35th episode of 60 Songs that Explain the 90s, Cole in the 2000s. And this week we are discussing, I believe, in a thing called love. By the Darkness. From their 2003 debut album called Permission to Land. Also, Darkness frontman

Justin Hawkins is naked as this video begins. And I think his nudity is somehow audible. I got to do an ad break now, or HR is going to yell at me. again. All right. Fantastic. Grunge did not kill hair metal. Rock and roll is not a monolith. As a naive, impressionable, Wayne's world-loving teenager, I struggled to wrap my head around this. The media attention, the critical attention, the hype at any given time led me to the conclusion that there was only one type of rock music happening at that particular time. But just as Queen was not the only type of rock music happening in 1975. Grunge was not the only type of rock music in the early 90s. Pop punk, Green Day, the offspring, etc., was not the only type of rock music in the mid-90s. New metal with the turntables and the rapping and whatnot, Limp Biscuit and various other dickheads.

New metal was not the only type of rock music in the late 90s. And the super cool garage adjacent Rock is back crew, the strokes, the white stripes, the hives, etc., that was not the only type of rock music in the early 2000s. Anywhere in that span, anywhere in the span of human history, you can also find an anachronistic, rowdy, sleazy, heavily tattooed, so uncool, they're kind of cool, meat and potatoes, all caps, rock and roll band, singing about how much they love cocaine. Sometimes those bands could be hard to spot, though. Not this time. Here we have the Anaheim, California rock band Buck Cherry, one word, and their hit 1999 debut single, lit up. Mama, can you wait? I forgot about that part. Referring to an

attractive lady as Mama is an Aerosmith coded move for me. I realize Aerosmith did not invent that, but I always think of Aerosmith. Anyway, the shirtless, gyrating supertank. tattooed cocaine-loven gentleman in the lit-up video is, of course, Buckcherry frontman Josh Todd, who has two first names. Josh is always talking to the press about how rock and roll is trying so hard to be cool that it's not actually cool anymore. Talking to Rolling Stone Australia in 2016 about why he wrote a song called Tight Pants, Josh says, quote, because a woman's arse is fantastic, and he laughs.

and he says, quote, let me tell you what's missing in rock and roll. You used to be able to dance to it. There was also a lot of sexual innuendo. It was fun. It was a party. It was a really good time. You can't find that anymore unless you go to pop music. People aren't singing about stuff that's sexy and fun.

Plus, there's not a lot of great frontmen. The ones I love are those that the guys want to be and the girls want to fuck. We also need more guitar heroes. We need more great frontmen. With both of those in place, there'd be a really good movement again. End quote. That is Josh's legitimately thoughtful response to the question, why did you write a song called tight pants? Verbatim, the question is, quote, why write a song, parenthesis, tight pants, close parenthesis, about a woman's arse, end quote. That's a great question. Buck Cherry did not sound very much like 1999 in 1999.

But that was the point. That was Buck Cherry's value proposition. Every era of rock and roll needs, let me tell you what's missing in rock and roll type bands. Buck Cherry were your favorite rock band in 1999. If you thought most other rock bands in 1999, sucked. And these fellas have put out 11 albums and prospered and persevered and only grown more sophisticated. For example, in 2014, Buck Cherry released an EP called Fuck. Six songs total on the fuck EP.

Track one, somebody fucked with me. Track two, say fuck it. Track three, the motherfucker. Track four, I don't give a fuck. Track five, it's a fucking disaster. And finally, track six, fist fuck. I wish that one weren't last. I will say that. I would have preferred to say one of those other song titles last, but I was trying to respect Buck Cherry's intent. I should have just made up my own track listing.

Nobody would have checked that. Also, Buck Cherry released their Fuck EP on their very own record label, which they named F-Bomb Records. F-Hifin-Bomb. Would I respect Buck Cherry Just a tiny bit more If they'd summoned the necessary courage To name their label

Fuck Records? Yes Yes, I would respect them a tiny bit more Are we doing this or are we doing this? F-bom records Now is not the time for half measures Buck Cherry Let me refer you to track two on your own

Fuck EP Which, if you'll recall, is called Say Fuck It Hey, guess what? But it turns out that Say Fuck It by Buck Cherry is a cover of I Love It, the 2012 smash hit. I love the cocaine pop song by Icona Pop and Charlie XX with the line I love it replaced by Say Fuck It. It's a great idea. Meanwhile, by 2003, the rock and roll landscape has gotten even more chaotic and confusing

in that it's increasingly hard to tell the old bands from the new bands and to tell the cool bands from the so uncool they're almost cool bands. Sincere question, how cool or not cool is this precisely? Here we have Jet from Melbourne, Australia, with their Blockbuster 2003 debut hit single, Are You Gonna Be My Girl? No question mark. And by one way of thinking, this is peak 2003. It's scruffy, strokes-adjacent garage rock.

It's soundtracking a viral iPod ad. It is absolutely loaded with 70 signifiers in an emphatically 21st century sort of way. The black and white video, the guitarists, ACDC T-shirts, the tambourine, the quasi-motown bounce that sounds like Iggy Pop's lust for life. Even if Jet insists they weren't trying to rip off lust for life. Does all of that make this song cool or hopelessly uncool? Jet frontman Nick Sester talks a lot about how he wrote a lot of the first Jet album while sitting on the toilet. That also could go either way, coolness-wise. Yes? I said, are you going to be my girl?

The singer's prodigious mutton chops are quite 2000s via 1970s. as well. That's Jet frontman Nick Sester's brother, Chris Sester, on drums, by the way. Rock bands are cooler if there's brothers in him. Talking to Ticketmaster in 2024, that's cool. Nick says, quote, the whole premise of Jet was to write straight up rock and roll. We grew up listening to our parents' rock and roll records. So what was interesting to us was rock and roll that had swagger and was sexy and you could dance to it. End quote. That's Buck Cherry talk, though. That doesn't sound like a guy trying to be cool or current. That sounds like a guy trying to start the band you loved in 2003 if you thought all other 2003 rock bands sucked.

And that attitude, of course, leads to cool people thinking that Jet sucks. A Jet's second album released in 2006 and called Shine On, that's the album that Pitchfork famously reviews by simply posting a GIF of a monkey peeing in its own mouth. We're a video podcast now. We can show that gif. There it is. No, it is. That's the IKEA monkey.

That's my mistake. That's the monkey that they found swaggering through an IKEA in Toronto in 2012. Jet's cool with me, but nobody in Jet is pulling off that coat. I'll tell you that much. I love the IKEA monkey. And if we're talking viral monkeys,

I vastly prefer the IKEA monkey. to the Jet Pitchfork peeing monkey. Just a personal preference. For a band that sounds an awful lot like the strokes, I have never personally equated Jet with the strokes because the strokes are cool and Jet are not. Rock and roll is very confusing to me in the early 2000s. You can't tell the cool bands from the uncool bands.

You can't tell the old bands from the new bands. Oh, you say you want fun party music, but rock and roll doesn't do that anymore. Try finding anybody partying harder than this guy. Andrew WK. Party Hard, 2001. Andrew is returning rock and roll to first principles, specifically the principle of partying hard, and the party hard video is just robust, sweaty dudes thrashing around Buck Cherry style.

But Party Hard the song sounds like you're getting beaten to death by a giant sentient iPod. Is this man from the future? Is this man from the distant past? Is this man serious? Maybe that's the confusion of early 2000s rock music. Are you serious? Was a question I was constantly asking back then as a confused 20-something. Are these people serious?

Are the critics who love these people serious? The Donnas. Take It Off. 2002. The Donnas are from Palo Alto, California. The key to a high school talent show themed video is to have a few scruffy burnout kids in the audience who really dig your band, but not too many people. Because too many people digging your band isn't cool. Do you know dazed and confused the great Richard Linklater movie from 1993, about 70s high school kids? Matthew McCona. of Hay going, all right, all right, all right, and so forth. Question for you, do you remember dazed and confused now as a 90s movie or a 70s movie? Or specifically as a 90s doing the 70s movie? I am similarly pleasantly temporally vexed by the Donnas, who debuted in 1998 with an album called American Teenage Rock and Roll Machine and put out an album called The Donnas Turn 21 in 2001, And yet every word of every Donna's song sounds like it was scratched with a butterfly knife into a high school desk in 1976.

They sound a little bit like the runaways and a lot like kiss. And they're very clearly, very serious about sounding like a 21st century American young adult rock and roll machine. But they also look and sound and act like their geometry teacher put them in detention. for 25 years. Same with the band Drunk Horse. Do you know Drunk Horse? It's a great band name. Drunk Horse are from Oakland, California.

I love Oakland. In 2003, Drunk Horse put out an album called Adult Situations. It's a great title. With an album cover, I would characterize as tastelessly censored. And this song is called National Lust.

It's a great title. And National Lust was one of my favorite rock and roll songs of 2003, in part because even now, every few months, a line from this song pops into my head, and instantly I'm in a fantastic mood. The line is, tight pants make it hard not to think about sexual intercourse. I think we've established that this is a fantastic premise for a rock and roll song. It is 2003, and with lots of rock bands, we're dancing, we're having fun, we're having a party, we're pissing off our parents but also directly emulating the music of our parents. And as requested, we're indulging in lots of sexual innuendo.

But this word, innuendo, it implies a sneakiness, a cageiness, a plausible deniability. Double entendres and that sort of thing. Whereas we're looking for single entondras. And we'd like our new stuck-in-detention rock stars to be as direct as possible. They are called The Darkness. It's a great band name, but it's pretty dark. They are from low-stoft, East Suffolk, England. I have never been there, but it sounds lovely.

And they first break out via a ridiculous operatic 70s glam rock anthem called Get Your Hands Off My Woman. The Darkness consists of Justin Hawkins on lead vocals and guitar, his big brother, Dan Hawkins, also on guitar. rock bands are cooler, if there's brothers in them, Frankie Palane on bass and Ed Graham on drums. Unfortunately, even when you're staring right at them, it's easy to forget there's three other guys in this band

when you got frontman Justin Hawkins prancing around in a bare-chested zebra-striped cat suit like he's porno beetle juice. Did you know that the first line of this song is, You are drunk and you are surly? I didn't. I really dig Justin Hawkins singing that line like he's auditioning for the barber of Seville.

All these concert-based rock videos spanning 30 years now, they all look remarkably alike, don't they? You got four or five hairy, grimy, surly dudes rocking out on stage. There is a comforting similarity. But falsetto porno beetle juice, this guy's a little bit out of the ordinary. Yes, the silliness, the Freddie Mercury swagger, the uncouth language, the flagrant what's wrong with being sexiness.

Justin Hawkins is really going for it. In an early 2000s rock and roll culture, where most frontmen aren't really going for it. You don't see a lot of zebra-striped cat suits in 2003. This song, Get Your Hands Off My Woman, is about some motherfucker who won't get his hands off Justin's woman. In the pre-chorus, Justin valiantly acknowledges his woman's bodily autonomy. Oh, I've got no right to lay claim to her frame. She's not my possession. And then he calls the motherfucker another 5,000-pound swear word.

The way that Darkness frontman Justin Hawkins points emphatically when he hits that last note, that's how you know this chorus is going to biblically whip ass. Are these people serious? What does being serious mean in this context? To put it in the crudest, laziest rock critic terms, the formula here is ACDC plus queen plus irony, question mark, equals the darkness. The ACDC part, the exquisite knucklehead, chunky guitar riff part,

you get that immediately on this first darkness album, on the opening track, which is called Black Shuck, and is about a dog that doesn't give a fuck. Black Shuck, in fact, is about a dog that doesn't give a fuck and mauled two churchgoers in the year 1577 in Blytheburg, a small English town south of Lowstoft. As the Darkness guitarist Dan Hawkins told the magazine Total Guitar in 2011, quote, you wouldn't exactly hear Bon Jovi writing a song about a church in Blythburg, would you?

End quote. The darkness are extremely, proudly, relentlessly English. They will take great pains throughout their tumultuous, but improbably lengthy career, to remind you that they are English. And we start right here on track one, album one. Talking to the website Music Radar about Loastoft in 2023, Justin Hawkins says, quote, I've definitely found there's a lot of truth in that expression,

Never forget where you come from. What set us apart was that town. For us, it is really a geographical foundation. And if you don't have that framework, then you've lost it and you're just trying to be global. That was really important, lyrically, with stuff like Black Shuck. End quote. This song also gives Justin the chance to operatically sing the word parishioners. I had to get the in his eyes.

in there. The darkness are not screwing around or the darkness are blatantly screwing around. The sound of this permission to land record is gloriously anachronistic. The sound is 70s glam rock multiplied by 80s hair metal. But in 2003, we're used to new bands sounding like old bands. But now the style and the attitude is also anachronistic. Vocally and visually, Justin Hawkins is proudly channeling Freddie Mercury. He's channeling David Lee Roth. He's preening. He's mugging. He's porno clowning around.

He's got armadillos in his trousers or his catsos, whatever. He is preposterous. And the darkness are funny. But just because you're funny, that doesn't mean you're joking. Right? Talking to the English journalist James Gill in 2002, before the darkness, even got a record deal. Justin Hawkins says, quote, Rock is funny by definition.

ACDC had a dude in school uniform for no reason, and they've done it ever since. Now there is a culture of that can't be real. Rock is about the suspension of belief. It's like that's not acceptable anymore. Just be moved by the music. Where's the problem? End quote. This song is called Growing on Me.

One potential problem is that it's kind of, gross. Yeah, this song is about having a sexually transmitted disease. Technically, growing on me qualifies as a double entendre, as innuendo, but only technically. I can't get you out of my head. That's gross, man. That can't be real, man. Justin Hawkins is frequently nude in this video as well, but at least he's tastefully

pixelated. And when he's not nude in this video, Justin is often dressed in a sparkly white jumpsuit just in case you are tempted to forget that he is the front man. The chorus call and response there of, You're really growing on me or am I growing on you? It's quite profound, profound and also gross. Just because you got jokes doesn't mean you're a joke band.

Yes? In 2005, the Sony A&R man, Nick Raphael, did an interview with the website Hit Quarters, and he talked about trying and failing to sign. of the darkness. Nick says, quote, there couldn't have been less of a buzz, and only two record labels showed any interest in them. The business as a whole thought they were uncool. In fact, people were saying that they were a joke and that they weren't real. Now, 3.5 million records later, they're one of the greatest of all bands in the world, and that's because what they did was real.

They weren't copying anyone. If they were copying, then they were copying someone from 20 years ago, and no one else was doing that. End quote. Well said. Here's a darkness song called Friday Night. I just love the way Justin Hawkins sings the word badmitten. They're even playing badminton and ping pong in the video. That's dedication.

Hey, here's another super fun, upbeat, chunky ACDC riff-type, delightfully jaunty song called. given up. Oof, except my mama here actually refers to the singer's mother, and lyrically, this is a super gnarly song about being addicted to heroin. Dan Hawkins, the guitarist, has helpfully clarified that his little brother Justin has never actually tried heroin in his life, but nonetheless, drugs are a significant part of the equation with the darkness, and there's legit darkness amid the jauntiness. though sometimes you do just want a soaring, transcendent, majestic power ballad, don't you? This song's called Holding My Own. I love this one. The incendiary guitar action, punctuating every word right there.

I'm holding my own. That's a double entendre, by the way, that phrase. I'll leave you to explore this song lyrically in private. This is a phenomenal debut rock and roll album, Permission to Land. and it is consistently phenomenal. And I say that even though one phenomenal song immediately eclipsed all the other ones. This dude really is naked and pixelated a lot.

The first remarkable aspect of I believe in a thing called love to me is that the central guitar riff here is so fantastic, that it doesn't matter. that the lyrics are pretty dumb. Endearingly so. The lyrics are stupider than they are clever. My heart's an overdrive and you're behind the steering wheel. That winsome clunkiness only underscores how in love Justin Hawkins is.

He's so in love that his powers of wordplay have severely diminished. Indeed, the pre-chorus is just Justin Hawkins singing, touching you, touching me, touching you, yeah, you're touching me, whilst wearing, yet again, a bare-chested cat suit and reclining on a giant pillow in a purple spaceship decorated with a statue of cavorting naked ladies. This dude takes great pains to remind you that he is the lead singer. I believe in a thing called love is a song about believing in a thing called love. Talking to songwriting magazine in 2018, Justin says, I had this thing in my head that if we had songs with love in the title, we'd be successful.

There were a lot of bands that were trying not to write about love, or they were writing about love but without saying the word, like they were too cool to say it. I thought, fuck that. Think about some of the greatest songs of all time. They have love in the title. It's there for a reason, because it's something we can all feel and understand what it means.

To feel embarrassed by it is a bit immature, really, end quote. And the darkness certainly don't want to seem immature. Chorus. It's the chorus to I believe in a thing called love that makes this the darkness song to rule them all. Yes, the ludicrous ultra falsetto karaoke heat check of this chorus. You're at karaoke, you've had 3.5 alcoholic beverages,

and you stumble across, I believe in a thing called love in the songbook, and you think, I can do this. You can't. Every note of this chorus will physically kill you if you attempt to sing it. That's what makes this song great. That's what makes this song rock and roll. You know, it's also super rock and roll, the lead singer yelling,

guitar before the guitar solo, outro. At this point in the video, a giant space octopus, Or something is attacking the band's Lord Helmet Spaceship. I don't think you really want me trying to assess these videos on like a plot level. I believe in a thing called Love is the song that lands the darkness on the cover of Spin magazine. Well, it lands Justin Hawkins on the cover of Spin magazine. Well, it lands Justin Hawkins on the cover of Spin with three other people under the headline, The Next Big Things. This is February 2004.

And if anybody knows what's going on rock and roll-wise, it's Spin Magazine. And yet, with this cover, Spin Magazine is clearly saying, nobody knows what's going on, rock-and-roll-wise. Left or right on this cover, we got Paul Banks of Interpol, dapper, gloomy, New Yorkers, emulating the 70s in a different way. We got Brodie Doll. She is the lead singer of the great L.A. super grimy punk band, The Distillers. We got Justin Hawkins, wearing a giant white coat and pink and white striped pants, making angel wings with his hands, and his legs spread as wide as possible.

And finally, we got Jeff Rickley of the New Jersey post-hardcore band Thursday. Thursday are fantastic, and they can be quite bombastic, and yet nary a jumpsuit in Jeff's closet, I imagine. This magazine cover, these are four very distinct ideas of what? what the term rock star means. And rest assured, only Justin Hawkins is channeling rock stardom in the 70s glam rock and 80s hair metal sense. In this article, Spin asks all four of these people what band they most admire, whose career they most admire.

And Justin Hawkins says, quote, in terms of experiencing lineup changes and still maintaining credibility when you hit back, it's aerosmith. They all had their differences. One of the best things about the Stephen Davis Aerosmith biography, it's called Walk This Way, is that there is no happy ending. They're all still bitter, and they've still got issues with each other, but they're still working it.

And it's still a valiant, enviable position to be in, to be a member of Aerosmith. End quote. Look who it is. The second Darkness album is released in 2005 and is called One, one-way ticket to hell dot dot dot and back. Wordplay. Two observations. This song's guitar riff is nearly identical to the outro of I Believe in a thing called love.

And also, this song is about cocaine. Yeah, in the one-way ticket video, hell has frozen over with snow and the darkness are stuck in a giant snow globe. and then they have to climb a giant mountain of snow. Also, this song starts with the sound of someone sniffing cocaine. Justin Hawkins has said in interviews that at his peak or his rock bottom, I suppose, he spent 150,000 pounds a year on cocaine. I don't know what that translates to in American dollars, but I imagine it's a lot.

This song is dumb and repetitive, and I love it. I can imagine Wayne and Garth and the other guys in that blue car in the Wainsworld movie singing this. The second darkness album. Okay, there's a song on this record called English Country Garden. There's a song on this record called Knockers, the full spectrum of the human experience.

I picked up my 14-year-old son from middle school the other day and I was listening to this album and I failed to anticipate the inevitable, right? So I'm driving and my son's riding shotgun and Knockers comes on, and it says that right on the little screen, and my son looks at the screen, looks out the window. Doesn't say anything. Doesn't acknowledge it.

Just silent, palpable shame. Everyone in my family knows better than to engage with me at this point. I'm a liability. I've gone from unfit to work in an office to unfit to work in my own house. I'm going to end up doing this show alone in a story. storage unit or perhaps a sewer. From here, the darkness run into some drug-related issues, some extended hiatuses, et cetera. Let's not get into it.

Here's what you need to know. And Buck Cherry know this also. You can't be the I Love the Cocaine Band for 25 years. You physically can't. You can be the I loved the cocaine band. But that is different. In 2012, seven years later, the Darkness released their third album called Hot Cakes. I have been preparing myself to say that out loud for several weeks.

Oh, wow, look at this cover. For you audio only folks, this cover, it's a tasteful illustration of three foxy, scantily clad ladies reclining on a bed of pancakes. also they are covered in what appears to be maple syrup. The pancakes are covered in maple syrup. And also the women. This cover is so incredible that I'm afraid to listen to the actual album, lest it not live up to the cover. You feel me?

Same deal, actually, with the sixth album by the Darkness, which is released in 2019 and is called Easter is canceled. Holy shit. Get a load of this cover. Look at super buff Jesus smiling on the cross. What on earth is going on here? If I'm reading this image correctly, and I'd like to believe that I am, I believe that darkness are triumphantly disrupting and thus preventing the crucifixion of Jesus, which would mean that technically Good Friday is canceled, but never mind. Let them cook. That cover is amazing. I am amazed. I'm afraid to listen to this album also out of profound respect. But I will love this band forever. And I will love both of these albums forever, even if I never hear them. And I encourage you all to share these albums with your friends and your family.

Just maybe don't talk about this band with your coworkers at work. We are delighted to be joined once again by Jill Hopkins, journalist and podcast superstar and Chicago Institution. She is the civic events producer at Metro Chicago and G-Man Tavern. She hosts myriad live events. She is very busy and she is very tired. Jill, thank you so much for taking the time to be here. Thank you, Rob.

I am out of bed. I am drinking a non-sleepy time tea for a change. And I am so excited. Thank you for having me back. Of course. grateful to have you. You mentioned to me that you saw the darkness, I think in 2003 at the double door in Chicago. You also mentioned that that was your wedding venue. True. The double door. And so what was the better show? So, okay, so my wedding, the greatest day of my life,

listen. Sure. I don't have children. So that was the greatest day of my life. Not the day my kids were born, which I imagine were your best days. But the darkness put on a hell of a show. They were so good. Yes. They're one of those bands that even without knowing what they look like or having seen a video, you hear the album or whatever, and you're like, I bet these guys really turn it out.

Like, you can just tell. Yeah. So they were great. And it's the Double Door, and this was like in its. heyday. And I miss that venue so much. It was my favorite place to see shows. But it's a small room.

I don't remember what the capacity was, but I can't imagine it was more than like 400. And just on a single level, like not really a balcony situation. And those dudes just, they did not come to play. They were taking over. They were taking over.

And so say all of us. Let's tap into a mayor. It is. There is so much. I try to resist it, but there is just so much spinal tap in this entire situation. I just, I want to just quote the entire movie to myself and to others

the entire time I'm listening to this. But I don't mean that as a slight. Of course not. That's a compliment. Complementary. Like, they knew what we needed as a society. in 2003, which at the time felt, you know, as an American woman, felt like kind of drudgery.

It was the Bush administration. You know, we're going to like, you know, the protests and stuff. Yeah. And we're like, I can't imagine it could get any worse than this. Yes, yes. And here we are. And here we are. I know it was 20 plus years ago, but I imagine the crowd.

Like when I saw the darkness, what I responded to was the joy, like the elation. Like we're enjoying being a rock band and you're enjoying watching this rock band, which is not a vibe. As much as I love like Interpol, for example, like that joy is not the transmitted emotion there. Like do the darkness like summon up sort of a joyful elation that not many rock bands in 2003 were, trying to create. Oh yeah, it was a very, it felt like nationally, internationally. Chicago's rock bands were all about the fun and the vibes and the joy. We had a great scene in 2003, still do.

But like, in 2003, there were bands like Bible the Devil and Las Vegas and just, you know, really great, swaggy, tongue and cheek people who got. Got it. And then nationally, we're dealing with, like, the strokes and Interpol. And I've seen Interpol live. And I've seen Interpol live at like a house of vans in Brooklyn. Yes. There are people on skateboards while Interpol is playing.

And it was still not a joyful experience. They were skateboarding sullenly and within themselves. Yeah. It was, it was all the. And I do, I do. I love Interpol. I love Paul Banks. I think his album with, was it the Rizza or the Jizzah, one of the two?

He had a rap album. He sure did. And it was great. I played the heck out of it on my radio show. I think he's a great songwriter, but there needed to be some, you know, smiles at the show. There needed to be dancing on the dance floor. there needed to be girls in the front row

there needed to be this kind of attitude that I don't think we had seen since the late 80s and early 90s that they really captured and they were so much fun I shout out to my friend Hobbs who gave me his extra ticket

so we could go to this show and yeah I mean it was it was packed in it was sold out and folks were just beaming ear to ear. Just every

like little element that they brought to the stage brought more, you know, people looking at each other just like, what is happening? At some point, so there's a, it was a flat floor with a staircase right in the middle

that went down into the basement that had like another bar and like a closed circuit TV so you could see what was going on upstairs if you wanted to do that. And from the stage, there was a stairwell that went down into the basement

so you could get to the green room. So at some point, Justin Hawkins leaves through the stairwell on the stage. You know, the rest of the band is vamping or whatever. And he comes back up

through the stairwell in the middle of the floor on the shoulders of his tour manager in a different jumpsuit than he was wearing when he left the stage. A costume change. A costume change. And everybody lost their minds.

It was what I think people think kiss must have been like. But I've also seen Kiss Live and I can't imagine that it was that much fun in the 70s. I mean, it was just, it was just fun. It was just the embodiment of a fun show. And there's not enough of that anymore. Or just in general, not even anymore. In general. Just in general.

We're not having the times that we should be having at the shows. Well, I was going to ask, I know you to be a big Pearl Jam person, and I was, you know, what you were interested in rock-wise in the 2000s. We go from like peak grunge and alternative rock, and later in the 90s that sort of fizzles out. Maybe you're in a pop punk. Maybe you're in a new metal. But like, what was your sense of what rock and roll was like in the early 2000s?

in 2003. And did the darkness, like, make sense in that context? Or was the whole point of the darkness how anomalous they were? What a blast from the past or just a breath of fresh air they were at that time. Like, this is a podcast, and people can't see the face that I made when you said pop punk or new metal. And it was, yeah. Okay. I sensed that.

I did, I did sense that. Yes. But, like, you know, like the early 2000s when things were looking kind of dire there after the pop punk and you know no

there's I've seen Fall Out Boy much love to those those local boys there's you know Chicago's also a great pop punk city but it was bleak I don't know how else to say it

and then like around 2022 when like the white stripes and the strokes and even like even hip hop needed a little something and like NERD was out of about and

there was the hives and the vines oh my God what a what an embarrassment of riches that came out around then there was an ethos and a sound that came out that hadn't existed in a few years that it was so grateful

so grateful for And then I was at a party for a bunch of dudes on Estrus Records. Like, that was a great record label. So we had like, yeah, it was a really good. Look it up. Hey, who was listening? Look up Escher's Records. Try to get them to come back.

But so there was a party, like a house party. And they were playing Queens of the Stone Age rated R. Like the full album at this party. And I had not heard it before. And when I tell you that my ears perked up, I was like, what is this? And not even the feel good hit of the summer, because that kind of blended into the background, mostly because we were all also doing drugs. Drugs, yes.

It felt like he was just narrating your experience in real time. Yeah, I was like, oh, all of those things, I'll take two. So, like, there was this, that kind of focused me. There was this great website called stoner rock.com that was this like one-stop shop for that kind of music. The Desert Sessions, Kaias, Fumanchu, you know, all that kind of stuff. And that's where I was in the early 2000s. And despite all of that, I never had bad feelings for, um, uh, like glam metal, the LA Sunset Strip kind of thing.

Poison, et cetera. Yeah. I think I'm in like that exact right age where I was like, yeah, unskinny bop is not offensive to me. I'm a 12-year-old girl. This is great. The ideal age to be for unskney-Bob. Oh, my God. It was, I mean, honestly, who else was unskinny-popping?

It was just the tweens. We were having a good time. So I didn't have like any ill will towards that kind of thing. So when the darkness came around, they felt like the exact right meld of this this early 2000s rock sensibility and the showmanship of a late 80s sunset strip band. I loved it. I love that. That's a great framing for that. That makes a lot of sense to me because I love Queens of the Stone Age 2.

and like they're not, they are a laugh out loud funny. Like, feel good hit of the summer is a laugh out loud funny song. Like, there's a lot of, I see a lot of connection between the darkness and the queens, just like the flamboyance and just the silliness almost, but like rocking silliness. Like, is that element important to you in a rock band? You love Pearl Jam, who are not the funniest band, whoever lived, but ideally is there some sense of humor about your ideal rock band? Oh my gosh, yes.

I mean, I saw Spinal Tap 2 in a theater. I spent money just a few months ago to just reclaim that emotion. I think a tongue-and-cheek attitude can really elevate a band. If you take yourself a little too seriously, then, like, I don't need to take you seriously. You've taken yourself seriously enough for all of us. And there's, you know, there's bands. like, especially like in the 70s, Velvet Underground,

I feel like they took themselves pretty seriously. Pretty serious. Yeah. I feel like early YouTube did not take themselves seriously, but modern day YouTube totally takes themselves seriously. Yes. I think that R.E.M.

wanted to make you think that they were taking themselves seriously, but honestly, they were just a bunch of silly geese in a band from the South. and I do I very much appreciate a sense of humor in a band in the same way that I take it seriously

in a romantic partner like you know how you go out with somebody and you think they're hot or whatever they're really good looking and then you find out that they suck as a sense of humor person like you can't

you can't tell a joke They can't tell a joke. And they're just like, oh, my God, what a fucking disappointment. You're not going to marry someone who can't make you laugh. And I feel that way about bands. And the entire permission to land album is a laugh riot. They know what they're doing. They do.

They do. It's also extremely English, which I think is important. Like, this band is like very, very English. And I do think that that works for them. Like, does that work for you? Like, is there an exotic quality? Or is there, like, the silliness of singing about, like, you know, churches in the 1500s or whatever's going on on that record? Is the Englishness importance to the joy that you get from this band?

Just this morning. So we're listening to Permission to Land on the big TV in the bedroom as I'm getting my life together. And I'm looking at the lyrics and my husband's looking over my shoulder. and there was a phrase there, I think it was the Alco Straitz or something, in some song at the top of the album. And he's like, oh, those lyrics are clearly AI. What is that? That's not a thing.

And so I just looked it up. And I was like, it's a highway in like a town. In England, he's like, okay. I mean, it's so, some of the references are so niche. And I don't know if English shit is exotic, but. That's the wrong word. It's whiteness in a different font. It's whiteness in cursory.

More serifs, yes, yes, yes. It's an old English, old English font. But I do think that their regional pride, I don't know what else to put it, does make a difference. I like it when bands are just like, hey, we're from here and we're going to write this into it. Some people, there's a conversation about

what's the greatest American rock band? And the answer is REM, but there is a lot of talk about Bruce Springsteen in the East Street band or, you know, peak Aerosmith or whatever. And those, I think the thing about those groups is that they are very much from where they're from. Like, they don't try to be, like, just a generic thing. They are talking about the stuff that's going on where they are.

And Chicago has a lot of civic pride. And I love that. Even when, like, people move away, there's still just a Chicagoanist about them. And there's very, very, very, very. Anglo things going on with the darkness. Well, also, not having the thing that sometimes, you know, when bands are British and they don't sing in their accents,

I don't know what the word is for that. And they're not like, oh, I might, we're the, I'm so bad at impressions. That was great. That was fantastic. That was a perfect, pitch perfect. Oh, my God, I'm working here. at the end of that.

But they're very British, down to the teeth. They got British-ass teeth. Yeah, it's true. It would be a great quiz. Go ahead. Just like, you can't tell a band from just this. I have British teeth, and I'm from the south side of Chicago.

I don't know. But, like, there is something very quintessentially British about them that I think is endearing. And it does make them more. make them more likable, I think. It would be a great quiz, like English or AI, like, lyrically. It's one, it's tough. It's going to be harder than you think.

You're not going to get 100% on that. I think this is how you become a millionaire, Rob. You make that and then you sell it to the NYT games. Yeah, right next to Wordle, totally. Connections, wordle, whatever you call this. Yes. It'll be less frustrating than connections. My kids don't like connections either.

They get very angry at the purple blue. Because why are they just gaslighting us, Rob? It is. It's obnoxious. It's designed to annoy you. That's the most annoying thing about the New York Times in 2026. By far, that's easily. Yeah.

You know. That's our biggest problem. I'm very jealous that you got two catsuits at the darkness show that you got like a costume change, right? Because I do think Justin Hawkins, looks, acts, and dresses like a rock star in a way that I don't remember very many, if any, other people dressing in 2003. It's like looking the part, another key component of this band playing the part. Yeah.

And like I said, this is a podcast so people won't see, but you can see behind me there's a poster of Prince. There's a poster of David Lee Roth-era Van Halen. So I'm obviously a fan of a showmanship in a lead in a front person. And Justin Hawkins is all of those things rolled in one. Same with the hives. That was another band that I was like, what else are these dudes going to do for a living? Sell cars?

Like they're not going to. This is their calling, obviously. Yes. Like, he couldn't have done another job for work. Genetically blessed with that voice, but also with the kind of wayfish male body that allows a women's extra small cats. Very, very lift frame. Yes. Yeah.

And like, not everyone can just be carried around by their tour manager. That's a good point. You'd have to be built a certain way. I am not a easily liftable person myself. Nor I. Nor I. Realize how much boobs and ass way. And they think that they can just get me up there like Baby Houser at the end of dirty dancing.

But no, I'm very dense as a human being. Justin Hawkins, if he told me that he could fly, I would believe him. Totally. Like he would take to the wind like a leaf in a breeze. That's right, a flying squirrel, evil-can-eval sort of vibe. Totally, totally. And he's got that range, the vocal range that's great. And, you know, just like a curled lip kind of eye contact situation.

There's a little bit of Elvis in there. There's a lot of David Lee Roth. There's a lot of Freddie Mercury in there. There's, and also his... own thing, his own thing. And like the fact that he and his brother are in the band together, they must have been a menace at home. I don't know what their parents. Yeah, their parents are still recovering. I know. I hope they bought them a house or something. Passed out on the couch or something, or an RV at least. I don't know if that's an English

conception. But yeah, they deserve. The caravet. There we go. Yes. But I mean, there's nothing that that guy could have done other than be the lead singer in a very flamboyant rock band. Like, if he just decided to do like a, you know, a Woody Guthrie thing, people would be like, no. I don't. Get out of here. I don't want to hear about the Dust Bowl, Justin. Thank you. We're all set.

We've got enough songs about the troubles or whatever it is. He's singing about. He's British. He's singing about the Chinese. That's true. Let's not even speculate. No, I won't. About the folk rock career of Justin Hawkins that could not possibly exist.

Yes. He's just so good at it. He's so good. They're still putting out albums. They are. 20 plus years older and he's still just like. Yeah. Do it.

Good for him. I don't have that kind of energy anymore. No, no. I wouldn't wear a cat suit back then, but I would certainly would not wear a cat suit now. Yes. I mean, if somebody wants to pay me enough, I probably probably would. Yeah, I'm just putting that out there on your very popular podcast. That's right.

Yeah, DM Joe Hopkins at your social media side of course and just negotiate, yeah, work that out. I mean, I own catsuits. Looking for an accident. Excuse. Do you, do, are you pro or anti-guttar solo? Do we have too many guitar solos or not enough guitar solos in rock and roll, Jill? Pro guitar solo, pro bass solo, pro-drum solo, pro-vocal solo. Not enough.

Whoa. That's right. Not enough scatting. Sure. I'm just saying that these people, professional musicians, have practiced and worked hard the whole lives. And they deserve a little moment in the sun.

Also, I deserve to go to the restroom. Yes. Yes. I'll be right. Yes, totally, totally. You get your moment in the spotlight. I just don't have to be physically present to witness it. Exactly.

But I can still hear it. that's true and I'm going to be hovering over a seat and I'm just going to be like damn this guy is fucking rocking out but I mean honestly if you are good enough

that the rest of the people in your band have allowed you to have a solo and especially if those people are still on stage while you have a solo they haven't fucked off to the bathroom Just like watching, yeah, yeah. I have seen Alex Mann-Halen do magic for four minutes in a row.

That's a long time. That's a long time. I've seen Prince play a guitar for as long. I don't even know how long. In Prince time, 12 dates. Yeah, yes. A fortnight of Prince guitar soloing. Oh my gosh.

I have been witnessed to some of the greatest musicians that have ever existed, exhibiting their talent at the highest level. And I think that should be acknowledged and rewarded. If you don't like a guitar solo, I'm sorry that you don't appreciate joy. Well said. Yeah. Absolutely. Just to wrap up, you mentioned to me it was very funny the way you put it.

You host live band karaoke, or you used to host live band karaoke. And you said that around when the darkness hit, when I believe in a thing called love hit, you said, like, the white boys discovered their falsettos, I believe, was roughly paraphrate. The way, yes. How, what was that experience like? And have you ever heard anyone competently sing, I believe, in a thing called love in a karaoke setting? I will say that that was one of the best jobs I've ever had. It sounds like it.

It was really fun. And it honestly prepared me for so many other things that I've done in my life because you have to be prepared for anything. You're working with musicians who have to recall music on a dime in seconds, honestly. And sometimes there's songs where, as the host who, you know, you try to have as much knowledge of the song list as you can, sometimes you're just going to be on stage to rescue somebody if they... Ooh, that's tough.

If they need it. Yeah. Right. You would be surprised at how many people over the years were like, I want to sing Baby Gap back. And then you give them the lyrics and it just is like a Santa Claus scroll that keeps going. There's so many words. And they're like, oh, no. Yeah, 15 seconds in, it's like, I've made a terrible mistake.

Yeah. You just, you want the, you want the hook. You want the actual, you want to be removed from the stage physically. So do you have to, like, go in, like, you're like a permanent understudy for whoever's on stage and you have to wrap the rest of Baby Got Back? Not the rest, but sometimes you just need to just like give them the cue. You have to just be like, I like them around. Yeah, exactly. Sometimes people get all the way through verse, verse, chorus, verse, and then the bridge comes, and they have no idea what's going on.

The bridge. The bridge is tripped up. So many people fail at the bridge. But there's this song, I have seen several incredibly great versions of. These dudes, I don't know what is happening in their homes. or their cars or their showers, but they figured out that they can hit these notes and they want everyone to fucking know about it.

And I was always so here for it. There was, you know, an eye contact that you make with the people in the band. You're just like, okay, all right. Chad's got it. Okay, Kevin. It's always Chad. It's Chad or Kevin or Gary, 100%.

Oh, my goodness. James the third is up here. Just getting it. Okay, Jimbo. And like you are always, I feel so proud. I feel like, I'm up. I'm just like they come off the stage. I'm just like bring it in.

Give it. And then, you know, you get a hug from a busty black woman. I've made their week. They're just going to ride on that cloud. Still telling that story in 2026. Just as you are. There we go. What a beautiful thing.

What a beautiful thing rock and roll is. What a beautiful thing rock and roll is. It's one of my favorite beautiful things. I am just so jazzed about the darkness. Did you know that their current drummer is Roger Taylor from Queen's son? I did not know that. And yet I did. In your heart?

sense to me. Yeah, I knew that in my heart. I mean, it does make all the sense in the world. Also, this kid's name, a kid, he's probably a 40-year-old. Yeah, he's in his 30s. His name is Rufus Tiger Taylor. And I was like, there's no way that he did not give himself the name Tiger. And then I looked into it, and he was given the middle-name Tiger by Freddie Mercury. No better

The storer of metal names Oh Roger What have we named in Tidey? This is really good Cocaine in it? I don't know It's getting better

The accent is I don't know how it's possible But your English accent Is getting better If anybody wants to hire me for that That's right On your vastly popular podcast I'm just saying

I'm here I'm sag Jill, it is wonderful talking to you. This has been fantastic, and I'm so grateful for your time. Thank you. I've missed us, Rob. I miss us. I have.

And you're going to be back soon, so don't worry about that. I hope so. I'll see you in Ohio.