No Filler Music Podcast - Metallica - Ride the Lightning

Episode Date: October 28, 2019

On this week's episode we fight fires and summon Cthulhu with Metallica's second album Ride the Lightning. Determined not to follow the metal cliches that came before them, or even the trends that they themselves were setting in thrash metal, Metallica pushed themselves further on Ride, with more complex arrangements and deeper lyrical meaning at the core of the album. Bassist Cliff Burton spearheaded this shift in the band's sound, introducing the group to the basics of music theory and the writings of H.P. Lovecraft. So strap in and prepare yourself for 2000 volts of metal passing through your veins as we dive into the album that helped expand the boundaries of metal and solidified Metallica as the modern era. Tracklist Metallica - "Ride the Lightning" Metallica - "No Remorse" Metallica - "Fight Fire with Fire" Metallica - "For Whom the Bell Tolls" Metallica - "The Call of Ktulu" Hatchie - "Obsessed" Narrow Head - "Feels Like Sand" Metallica - "Trapped Under Ice" This show is part of Pantheon Podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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For alcohol, you must be legal drinking age. Please enjoy responsibly. Product availability varies by region. See app for details. I mean, I think a lot of these bands catch on to a lot of the cliches that are going on in heavy metal today. We try and shy away from as many of them as we can while still doing the sort of, I mean, in heavy metal, everything's already been done before. But we're trying to avoid as many of the cliches as we can. And I think some of the other speed metal bands and sort of underground thrash metal bands are just taking in all these cliches and it gets so unexciting or interesting.

Plus, I think also from a musical standpoint, we have a bit more to offer, just from the point of view that we try and put as much into the music as we can in terms of the song arrangements and song writings and tempo changes and stuff like that. And I think we're also maybe a little bit more serious musicians than most of these other bands. So sort of all that filling in together, there was Metallica.

And welcome to No Filler. The music podcast dedicated to sharing the often overlooked hidden gems that fill the space between the singles on our favorite records. My name is Travis. Got my brother Quentin here with me as always. And that was the voice of Mr. Lars Ulrich. in an interview, an MTV interview clip in 1985. He was talking about what makes Metallica different

than some of the other thrash metal bands that were coming out around that time. And I think this record in particular that we're talking about, which is Ride the Lightning, is when you really start to see that shift that makes them so unique. So Q. We finally arrived at the Metallica episode,

an episode that was, you know, destined to happen since the inception of this podcast. Yeah, there's a handful of artists that, like, before we even started recording and, like, before we even, like, right when we had this idea to do this podcast, we're like, all right, we're definitely going to be covering these guys. At some point, we've got to cover this album, you know. Metallica is for sure one of those bands. Yeah, well, the funny thing is, like, forever. I've had Injustice for All as the album that we're going to talk about.

And for whatever reason in the last few weeks, I was like, you know, let's talk about Ryder Lightning. We'll talk about Injustice later. But what I like about Righty, the Lightning in particular, if you're familiar with Killem All, their first album, it's like super like, it's essentially like thrash metal being defined, you know, like they're really one of the first bands to come out of the thrash metal, like underground scene, like they helped define the genre. And it's super fast and thrashy and like a little bit of, you know, punk rock mixed in there and whatnot.

And then, right, the lightning is when they started doing the things that Metallica has always done, which is like innovate and like, you know, that's kind of what Lars was saying in that interview clip there, stray away from like the cliches and stuff of metal. That's what they've always tried to do. Okay. I just want to ask you a few questions real quick. you mentioned thrash metal, you used the word thrashy

to describe it. Like the guitars are a bit thrashy. All you're saying really is it's like really fast metal. Super fast, right? That's what thrash metal is. That's essentially what it is. Like if you want to boil it down, I mean, that's what it is.

Basically what thrash metal was doing was taking like the European-style heavy metal influence and blending it with some punk rock from the 80s to make the faster, that faster metal sound. What are some European metal bands that you could name off as influences for these guys? Like Motorhead. Bands like, you know, Iron Maiden, Def Leopard. See, that's the thing I just didn't know the origin, you know, I didn't know.

Those were European bands. So, okay. All right. So anyway, like I said on the last episode, I don't want to be. to get bogged down in like the history and like the details and like the facts and stuff of Metallica because I it's Metallica if you're you know if you're a Metallica fan and you're listening to this episode you're not going to learn anything new for me right that's not what this episode is about like we're going to just listen to the tunes and I'm going to talk about why I love

Metallica so much basically if you want to learn it and dive into Metallica you know for starters you could go and listen to Martin Popoff's podcast episode that he did a couple weeks back that we had mentioned earlier where he dove into five Metallica songs and like the history of their production. That was history in five songs. So that's another podcast on our network, Pantheon podcast. But my point being is like there's plenty of other places where you can get deep, deep dives into Metallica's history and, you know, Metallica. is, you know, techniques and all that stuff. Like this episode is just about playing the songs and talking about the songs.

That's it. Well, let's just put it this way. You know, if it's a somewhat or fairly popular band and we're doing an episode on it, we're not going to dive into the history. You know, we'll cover, we'll get into that stuff with more obscure bands, you know. But that's, we're not that. That's, that's not the purpose of this podcast, yeah. But like Travis is saying, I guarantee you if you go to the main like Pantheon podcast feed and, you know, search Metallica or search any other like more mainstream band that we might cover on no filler,

guarantee you you will find at least a handful of episodes that dive a little bit deeper into these bands in the network. Right. We're more about sharing the tunes and talking about why we love them. That's it. what tunes were sharing, the ones that aren't singles? The ones, well, I'm going to make an exception today, though, Q, but we'll talk about that in a second. What? No, I know. That's fine. So again, so we're talking about Ride the Lightning today, and this is their second album, Killem All came out first. And before we start playing tunes from this record, I wanted to play just one, one clip,

one tiny clip from their first album, Killem All, because number one, it's one of my favorite, like, Metallica intros like in their, in their discography, because of how, like, in your face, Kirk Hammett's guitar playing is. And I think it'll give a good, a good contrast into kind of what their next evolution was when they went to ride the lightning.

Okay, so just real quick, we're going to play this song because I just love the guitar solo. And that's the thing. It's right out the gate with the guitar solo. So that's awesome. All right. This song is called No Remorse. All right, Q, is your face melted off yet?

I'm picking up my lips from the floor. All right. So I just wanted to play that clip real quick because it's one of my favorite little intros. And I think what I always associate with Killem All is just how like relentless it was. You know what I mean? Like right up like the guitars are like piercing, you know. It's almost like you're getting fucking stabbed over and over again.

It's almost like they're trying to shove metal right up your ass. Yes, pretty much, dude. You're bending over and it's gone right up there. And you're taking it right up the tailpipe. Exactly. So when you get to ride the lightning, the songwriting, the song structures and like the arrangements, kind of like Lars was saying, got a little bit more sophisticated.

with this next record. He talks about like kind of switching up tempos throughout a song and just trying to steer clear from all the like stereotypes or. Exactly. I don't think he said stereotypes. He said cliches. He kept saying cliches. Clishes. Yeah.

So and what's funny to me, you know, and this is a tangent, but having come off the episode where we talked about Kimis and how they were almost embracing those cliches, Kimus is trying to recapture some of that and sort of repackage it, you know, and like make it their own versus Metallica when they were coming out with thrash metal and whatnot. You know, metal prior to the early 80s and stuff, you know, was kind of, and what it became throughout the 80s too

with all the hair metal stuff. It was kind of like, eh, you know. And they famously like were kind of like rally against the hair metal bands and how cliche it was, you know, and all the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the or are they the, the, the, the, the most, like, the prototype thrash metal band? They were definitely on the forefront of it and helped, like, define it. But because they're so, they were so innovative and would constantly innovate and never wanted to repeat themselves, every album,

they sort of, you know, it builds on the last one, you know, but they're always changing. Like their first, you know, I was, you know, I've talked about this before, but like their first four records is like Primo Metallica, you know, and Master of Puppets was like, considered one of the best metal albums of all time, you know, that was their third record. But it seems like with Metallica fans, even at the second record with Ride the Lightning, some of their hardcore fans were like disappointed at them because of, you know, they go from Killem All,

which was like an unapologetic thrash metal, like in your face metal album. And then on Ride the Lightning, on Fade to Black, you know, fourth track on the album, they have this, it's almost like a ballad, like an acoustic, it starts with acoustic guitars. It's more like slow and like ballad-like.

and their fans are like, what are you guys doing? You know? So then they just continue to be disappointed then. Like if you're saying they're continuing to evolve every episode, episode. Dude, why do we mix up the words album and episode all the time? That's a great question. Yeah, but that's the thing.

Like you can't please everybody, obviously. But I'm saying what I'm talking about is like by the time you get to justice for all and they put out the music video for one, that famously was the moment where the diehard Metallica fans were like, boo, you sold out, you know. Really? Because they, that's such a good song.

But it's because Metallica had for years been saying, oh, we're not going to put out of video. You know, that's the easy thing to do. Oh. And then they did it. But whatever.

Anyway, so you got a little taste there of the thrash metal that was on Gilamah with that one clip. But let's get right into, right of the lightning here. And we're going to, do the first track. It's called Fight Fire with Fire. Q, what's your first impression? I'm into it, dude. That's some speed metal. I'll give them that. Yeah, I mean, that, that's a classic

thrash riff right there. Just that, that level of, or that, that speed. But what did you think of the acoustic sort of intro there? It was very pretty. Great. And almost classical sounding, right? Yeah, it was, yeah, yeah. And, you know, we're not going to get into the, what seems like, global hatred of Lars for some reason. He's a good drummer, dude. Like, he's a solid drummer. I mean, you know, I'm not a drummer, so I don't know what it is about his drumming that people love to hate, you know? But, I mean, maybe you can should. So, I mean, is it because he really? lies on the double bass so much.

Honestly, I don't know because I'm not that kind of drummer, you know, but I don't know. Like, you're more in the metal scene, I guess, that I am like, I'm just a fan from the outside, you know. Well, but have you actually read what it is that people love to hate about Lars? I feel like I've heard, dude, this is random right here, dude. but I just read, I'm reading the Wikipedia page and I'm just read a sentence that popped out of me because of the name in the sentence here.

It says, music journalist Martin Popoff observed that Ride the Lightning offered sophistication and brutality in equal measure and a scene, a scene as something new at the time of its release. Wow, dude. Who knew that we were amongst fucking

music journalism royalty? People that are worthy of being quoted on Wikipedia. Oh, shit. So anyway, there's another shout out to Martin. So what's interesting about that acoustic riff, or at least to me, is that it actually came from Cliff, the bass player. James Hetfield said in an interview that they did that Cliff used to play that riff like all the time. And then it just made its way onto the album.

So I just think that's cool. So Cliff is actually, he deserves a lot of credit. for the sound that Metallica started to develop this early on, you know, in their career, because he was sort of more classically trained, I guess, and he sort of introduced, like, he brought his knowledge of music theory to the band and, like, sort of taught them, like, hey, here's, like, how to structure songs in a more, like, classical way, you know. Wow.

And that shows up in a big, big way at the end of this record with Call of Kutulu, which is we're going to play that a little bit later. So anyway, as everyone knows, actually, you know, we have another clip. We have another clip from Fire with Fire because this is, you're going to hear the guitar solo in this clip. And this is one of my favorite guitar solos on the record. because it's got these two very distinct parts, and it's got some dual guitar playing,

which is kind of a nod back to our chemist episode where, you know, I was gushing over the way that those two guys would do dual guitar solos. So maybe it's a nod back to Metallica, you know? So anyway, let's play the second clip. This is the solo for Fight Fire with Fire. It's fine. I know, dude.

it's uh there's just something about about the uh like the the sonic sonic harmonies you know and i love how you know there's that stretch where it's just Lars and his double bass you know and then like the main thrash riff comes back in i love the way they do that because it's like it's almost like the the guitar is sort of like kind of like running into like sort of catching up and running into it do you know what i'm talking about yeah Are you just saying? No. Are you just saying, yeah?

Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah, dude. Yeah. Anyway. All right. Let's get to the next track. And I know that I'm breaking like the golden cardinal rule of like, of no filler.

But for whom the bell tolls is one of my favorite Metallica songs. And it's, I mean, I can't, I can't not play it. I'm going to be disappointed if I don't get to talk about this. song. So we're going to do it. It was a promotional single, too, by the way. So I don't know, maybe that doesn't count. Oh, there you go. I'm kind of getting, okay. Kind of, you know, skirting the rules here a little bit. But I think, and I'm, I also want to play the song and talk about it with you, because I think this is a good, this song is a good example of, metal when it's done, right? Or at least in my opinion, like, this is a type of, of, of, of,

song, metal song that I love. And it's a great example of how Metallica has always been such good storytellers with their songs. So anyway, for whom the bell tolls, if you're a fan of Metallica, this is the song, this is probably, you know, the song is not new to you by any stretch of the imagination. You know what I mean? It's one of their classic songs. It's one of their most iconic songs. But anyway, we're going to talk about it. I'm not even a metal fan, and I know a good chunk of the lyrics in this song. Yeah. I mean, it's been used in, you know, movies and stuff.

Like, if you've ever seen the movie, Zombie Land, there was a really kick-ass, like, sort of montage in the beginning of, like, slow motion, like, zombies and shit running through the streets to this song. Yeah. It was fucking, the most fucking metal thing that's ever happened in movies, dude. I mean, that's not true. All right, so let's hear it. I've got two clips. Let's just get right into it. All right, so that was mainly just the intro that I wanted to play.

And what I love about it is it's two minutes before he starts saying anything, you know. And it does such a great job of like setting the tone and the mood, especially with the bells like right off the gate, you know? Yeah, the bells tolling. Yeah. The tolling bells. So is that something that just wasn't happening in metal? You know, like two-minute instrumental intros before starting a song?

Is that like were they one of the first ones to do that? No. I mean, if you think about back to, if we go back to the origin, if you will, to Black Sabbath, the title track to their first album, it was a similar kind of thing. And it even had bells in it in the intro. but like you know what made it Metallica being sort of I don't want to say innovative but like changing

and and evolving their sound is it's you know in contrast to the thrashy kill them all stuff it's a risk on their part you know to do something like this I mean I would say that this is still one of like one of the heaviest songs in their catalog not on like speed or like necessarily like the tone, but just the, like the lyrics and stuff, the subject matter. And the imagery. Yeah, the atmosphere that they're painting here, you know?

I'm sure you mentioned this earlier, but how many years in between ride the lightning and kill the moonlight? Was that an actual slip right there? Yes, it was. I didn't do that on purpose. How many years? It might not have even been a full year. I mean, Killamall came out in 83, ride the lining in 84.

As far as when the songs were written and stuff, it's probably all sort of in the same, like, general span of that year, you know. Wow. So, and you said that Cliff, you feel like, had a lot to do with, with the change in their approach to writing songs? Yeah, absolutely, because... Was he, was he in the Killamall sessions?

Yes, yeah. Yeah, he was the bass player up until he died in the, the bus wreck, the tour bus wreck. Also, I have to set the record straight, which is something we haven't done in a while. Although there's plenty of times probably where we should have done it and we didn't realize it.

Oh, yeah. But I said that this was Cliff's last record. It's not true. He was on Master of Puppets as well. So I was, I fucked up. That's all right. Hey, you're setting the record straight and it's fine. Setting the record straight.

So anyway, because of Cliff's background, and knowledge of music theory and stuff, he deserves a lot of credit for the Metallica sound, you know? So anyway, we're going to keep listening to the song because we didn't really hear any verse or chorus. So let's pick it up again here where we left off. And again, this is for whom the bell tolls. And that's kind of how it fades out,

and that's the rest of the song. So there's a part with the lyrics there. in the second, I guess it's the second verse. He says, take a look to the sky just before you die. It's the last time he will. And then usually in the performances, like, they shut the lights off in the arena, you know? And it's just really like, it's just, I don't know, it's fucking awesome. That's all I have to say about that.

Anyway, I love the lyrics. You've seen them live. I've seen them live once. It was, you know, maybe a decade ago. you know it's just one of those things yeah we actually drove to Arkansas to see dude that was 10 years ago probably maybe more than that

but anyway where does the time go it marches on cue oh wow anyway uh I just love the lyrics man I think James has always uh his his lyrics are what have

have sort of attracted me to Mattis Dalica in a lot of ways. He's a good songwriter, good story-teller. Yeah, he's a good storyteller. He's a good storyteller, like I was saying. And it's worth mentioning, it's not James. It's not just James who writes the lyrics. A lot of times it's James and Lars are the ones who come up with the lyrics and like the main reps.

I didn't know that about Lars. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I mean, Lars and James have been, you know, they're the two founding members of the band and they've been there since the beginning, you know. Anyway. So this song was kind of the first, one of the first Metallica songs to talk about. And like sort of the anti-war commentary. And that's obviously when you get to Master of Puppets, almost the entire album is about like anti-war.

You know, you got that song, Disposable Heroes. Does one show up on Master of Puppets or am I still wrong? No, man. How many times I got to tell you? God. That's on and justice for all. I'm sorry. But that's about a soldier, right?

Yes, yes. That's what I say. It's a theme that they read about throughout, you know. But this was one of the first songs where they wrote about that. And you notice that there was no guitar solo in the song. The drums were super simple, right? Very simple. I liked how he, you know, the,

I kind of like how Lars. just does a drum fill that just goes right along with what the guitar is doing. And maybe that's what people give him shit for because that's kind of an easy way out. But I thought it was impactful. It goes along with the song, though. Like there's aside from, you know, like I was saying, there's no guitar solo. The drums are really simple. There's even a quote here.

I'm reading an article where they talk about each song on this record. And Lars says, we often use for whom the bell tolls as a reference point for chasing simplicity. city. So, you know, they were very like purposeful about that. And I think, again, it's like, that's what made probably some of their fans like jump off and not, not really hang on, you know, is because if you came to the next Metallica record coming off of Killem All expecting more of the same, like you're, you're going to be disappointed. But if you're, you know, maybe I would say like a more true fan, like you probably appreciated. and respected them even more because of the risks that they would take and the changes that they would make.

I mean, you and I talk about this all the time with bands. It's like... All the time. Man, they really changed after this record and I'm not a fan of it anymore. You know, so what happened? Yeah. Well, they're constantly evolving as a group. Yeah.

I am more okay with it now. As long as it's not a situation where they clearly, quote unquote, sold out. Yeah, where they're changing and it seems. like they're changing, not necessarily because... To appease the record label or something like that. I'm not... I can't get into that, obviously. Right. But yeah, you know, I can appreciate a band evolving in their sound.

And it would be weird if they didn't. Right. I mean, as Metallica, kind of always talked about, like, in these early interviews and stuff, they just were doing what they wanted to do. You know what I mean? Like, they were trying not to follow any cliches. and they if they wanted to experiment and like do something crazy like they would they would do it so they always kind of followed themselves as far as like what they wanted to do like they would do it and like it's why they are one of the best metal bands of all time you know because of those risks that

they would take and whatnot all right so we got one more song here to play from this record and it is their first instrumental song to show up on a record. And of course, it's, you know, due in part to, if not entirely, to Cliff Burton. And the way that he sort of wanted to introduce more complex song structures and stuff to their songwriting. All right. So this song is called The Call of Kutulu. Yeah. So what's, like I said, what's kind of important about this song is that it's, you know, really the first song that where they took this concept of like, hey, let's, you know, let's make a really complex arrangement, you know, but through the Metallica lens, right? And it was, again, like another, another hat tip to

Mr. Burton, he like, both him and Kirk, Kirk Hammond is famously known as being like a, like a horror fan and enthusiasts and I think Burton was also sort of a fan of that genre so he was reading a lot of HP Lovecraft at the time and the Kutulu character shows up in that short story in the book The Shadow over Innsmouth and Burton introduced the rest of the band to that story and so So they took the idea of like, you know, Cthulhu, this, this, you know, God or whatever, this alien creature. And just sort of ran with that idea. And they changed the spelling of Cthulhu to Cotulu, K-T-U-L-U for easier pronunciation. At least that's what it says.

Or they just, they didn't know how to fucking spell it, you know. And they just cover their tracks. We're like, oh, yeah, we just, you know, we did that on purpose. All right, so before we play the next clip from Call at Cthulhu, let's take a quick break. And we're back. All right. Let's play the next clip here. Again, this is Call of Cotulu.

All right, so there you go. Pretty sweet guitar solo right there, right? It was good. I don't listen to a lot of music with the guitar solo, so I don't know what's good and what's not, dude. I mean, it's not a bad guitar solo. I'll tell you that right now. Yeah. That's good.

You know what I liked about? It seemed like throughout the entirety of the buildup, like you were saying, it was building up. It seemed like there were like just little guitar riff solo type stuff just kind of going on in the background all the way up to this like legit solo. Sure. Yeah. Yeah.

I mean, the guitar solo is definitely the climax, right? Yeah. So here's something that I like to do, Q. And maybe this is corny and stapid. But we've heard in episodes past that you like to and sometimes imagine some goofy shit when you're listening to music. Remember that discussion about Tosca? We did our Tosca episode back in the day.

The lady with the bubble bath. That's what's what I'm saying. Yeah, dude. What do you think of when you hear Kutu? Well, you have to, I mean, you got to think about what this song is doing, right? It's called The Call of Kutulu or Kthulu, right? Also, interestingly enough, I was reading some. more about this while that second clip was playing.

Some people theorize that the reason that they changed the name, or they changed the spelling of Cthulhu is because according to the story, mentioning Cthulhu by name or writing his name will summon him. That's like saying Bloody Mary three times. Yeah. So maybe they were trying to help out their fans and themselves by changing the spelling. that's really thoughtful of them yeah wasn't it so this song um anyway like i was trying to say like you gotta think about like it starts kind of slower right and it's got this buildup like they are

you're summoning cathulu or you know cathulu is you know emerging out of you know wherever the fuck he comes from right yeah the depths of the ocean or something i don't know anything about that that creature yeah anyway you know you got think of it that way like it's you're building up to this like kind of crescendo and then he's you know he has appeared you know yeah i can see that dude i can see like choppy stormy waters and katulu just emerging from the depths right yeah and like this thing like they've they've done stuff like that kind of throughout right like if you go on later to master of puppets and listen to a song called the thing that should not be which is also inspired by the same story and written by Cliff Burton,

I've always interpreted the guitar solo as this thing that should not be. Because the solo itself sounds like this like, really like, almost like, it sounds monster-like. And if you go back to kill them all and listen to the four horsemen, their guitar, like the cadence in their guitar playing, the stroke of the of the guitar pick whatever the fuck you want called sounds like galloping horses

you know what I mean so like they that's kind of what what they're doing you know anyway another quick fact about this song it showed up originally on a four-song demo for Ride the Lightning under a different name it was originally called when hell freezes over I'm kind of glad that they changed the name to call it Kudulu, because I think that's a cooler name. But one of the reasons that they changed it is because they sort of were realizing that, like, a lot of metal bands like to throw the word hell or Satan into their song titles. And because they wanted to avoid cliches, they didn't want to have a song on their record with the word hell in it.

So anyway, all right, that's that, man. I want to circle back and do injustice for all at some point because that's my favorite Metallica album and I want to pay it proper justice, you know? You see what I did there? Oh, I see what you did now. Anyway, so we'll do that later. I don't know when we're going to do it because after next week's sidetrack,

our metal month is officially over. So we're going to switch it up. And man, if you don't like metal, you haven't you haven't been listening probably to to any of our last few episodes you know so hopefully we'll we'll bring back the the non-metal fans maybe we'll give them some stuff to listen to here in a little bit

in a couple weeks. Yeah we should do like we should almost pull a 180 if we can. Yeah. Well I mean we can let's yeah let's let's do some a little bit lighter for the month of November. Yeah yeah we will. All right. That's that.

like I said, our metal month here is coming to an end. But next week, I've got a band, sort of another thrash metal band that we're going to talk about, that I've always loved this record. It's a band called Prong. Q, have you heard about Prong before? Never heard Prong. Okay, well, this is a fun record, man.

I love it. All right, let's do our What You Heard's, because we did not get a chance to do those last week. and man, I've got a doozy for us this week, did. But I'll let you go first. What you heard lately? I heard this on the radio. Don't even have to mention the name of the station anymore.

So I don't know if maybe I've just been like more ended to like more poppy stuff just because I've been getting buried in metal this last month. Yeah. But I heard this song by an artist named Hatchie. That's what she goes by her name. Harriet Pillbeam. She's a singer-songwriter from Australia.

Harriet Pillbeam? Harriet Pillbeam. Okay. Yeah. And like, so I actually listen to it to a good chunk of this album of this album of hers that came out just this past June.

It's called Keepsake. And it's just a straight-up pop album. I mean, like, it's just what it is. You know, it's just easy. listening, radio-friendly for the most part, you know, it's just a pop album. But the song that I heard on K-E-X-P just kind of stuck with me. She does mention My Bloody Valentine, Susie Sue, shit, some other... My Bloody Valentine.

Are we about to hear some more shoegays, Q? No, well, no, I think it's more influence than anything. you'll hear it a little bit with a guitar line that pops up in this clip that I'm going to play. But no, she's classified as dream pop, which like we had said in the past, Dream Pop and Shugase can be kind of synonymous. But she's way more poppy than that. Anyways, really good song. It's been kind of popping in my head ever since I heard it last week. So this is a song from Hatchie's debut studio album that came out earlier this year.

The album is called Keepsake, and this song is called Obsessed. I love that stuff, man. There's something like 90s about it. She mentions the cranberries as an influence as well. Yeah, definitely. Yeah, dude, that's just one of those songs, man. Like, I heard it and I was like, oh, shit, I'm into this, man. It's just a feel-good song.

Yeah, yeah. So is the whole record like that? Yeah, like I said, it's like, don't go into this. I'm expecting anything more than just a, you know, polished good. It's just a pop album, you know, like it, they really catchy, catchy hooks. I definitely agree with the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, the, voice kind of has that vibe. Yeah.

It's good. It's good stuff. Um, okay. So, I went and saw, um, dive last week. And this was a band that we had actually, I had brought the single. one of the singles as my sidetrack a couple weeks back off of their record deceiver, their new record deceiver. And, you know, it's a great album, right?

I've listened to it a few times now since it came out. It's a solid record. Yeah. But I'm bringing something else to the table. The reason I mentioned Dive is because the band that I saw open for them, led me down a path. And, you know, this is probably not news to anybody who is following indie bands right now. But I feel like, or I'm hopeful that this trend continues, it seems to me like Grunge

might be having a revival right now. So this band that opened for them. And the funny thing is like, this is confusing as fuck because the band that opened for them is also not my side track. But they were, they're called chastity. You said sidetrack. You meant what you heard. Yeah, they're not my what you heard. But this band is called chastity.

And they had a song at the end that was like, and the funny thing is my wife and I showed up as they were playing their last song. I'm not ashamed to admit that I'm at the stage where a lot of times I show up late to concerts now just to see the headliner because... Oh, dude, I still... I got to catch the openers, man. You never know what you're going to... I know, and I'm glad that we showed up to catch this last... I mean, you're proving...

Me saying this is proving that I'm stupid for doing this, but... Yeah. You know, it was a weeknight and, like, we don't have... I'm getting to the age that I don't have the energy to stand up for three hours. Ooh, dude. Depends on the venue, dude. But what I'm saying is like... You know, we're the same age, right?

I know that. But I'm saying after a day's work, you know, whatever. Hey, you know what, man? I know, dude, I know. And plus, you know, my wife's with me and she also, you know, I got to think about her too, you know. Anyway, this band Chastity, chastity, they looked like they were from the 90s as far as their dress. And that's another thing. I think that's pretty obvious.

If you walk through like Target or the mall, 90s and especially the grunge aesthetic is coming back. And as far as fashion is concerned. Sure. Dude, try living up here, man. It never left. Yeah. Well, there you go. Anyway, it sounded straight up like a, as far as the risk.

the bass, it was Nirvana, big time. Okay. And the record, I mean, the singer, he's not so much, he has his own kind of approach to the way he sings. He's bringing in some other sprinkling and some other influences and stuff. But anyway, I was like, man, this is sweet, man. Like, I'm all about this shit. I want Grunge to come back.

You know what I mean? So I went and I sort of looked into them a little bit, and I found this other band on Spotify called Narrow Head. and they're actually from Houston and they're super young this album came out in 2016 just a few years old but man they've got

they've got it the grun sound is back at least on this record and it's making me hopeful that this is a trend all right so enough hype enough talk yeah let's hear it man

this song is called feels like sand and I fucking love this song song. It's fucking great. So let's hear it. Again, this is feels like sand by narrow head. Yeah. The whole record is like that. Ooh, man, that's good. It's great. I like their harmonizing. Yeah. And that's some heavy shit, dude. It is the heavier side of grunge. But it's, what I like about it is, man, that's good. Yeah. Again, dude. Like when I heard this record, I was like, let's fucking do it this, man. Let's bring

back runs. Yeah. I love the album cover too. All right. So here's something else I wanted to point out. I'm glad you mentioned that. Type in right now into Spotify, Siamese Dream, because it's the record cover for, you see that? You see the color palette? The color palette. That's not a fucking coincidence. So if you pull that up side by side, like, it's literally the same colors. That's the same colors, but they throw on some blue. With the exception of the teal, but I mean, I, I, I can't, You can't. Yeah, you're right. There's no way that that's not on purpose. So, Siamese Dream had, you know, by Smashing Pumpkins, did like a re-release of the record. And, like, they sort of did this, like, duo tone thing on the photo of the two girls. And it's got this

orange background. And it's literally the same color palette with the exception of green. It's, it's the same orange and purple. Yeah. Yeah. So again, it's like, you know, they're not even hiding it, right? Anyway, so I kind of gave away my... That's great, man. Yeah, listen to that record. It's called Satisfaction. And for me, like, it's probably going to be pretty easy for me to catch a live show because they're from Texas.

So first chance I get, I'm going to go see these guys. Cool, dude. I would love to hear some of that. But yeah, dude, I'm fucking all about this, dude. I want this to happen in a big, bad way. All right. So next week, like I said, our very last metal episode, probably for a good while. is going to be a thrash metal band called prong.

And I think it's going to be a good way to wrap up the metal month with a nice little bow. And then in November, do we want to spill beans, Q? Or do we want to? No, no, let's not spill beans yet, too. All right, all right. Well, like you said, it's going to be a shift, a dramatic shift from metal. Because, you know, even at this point, I'm fucking tired of metal, dude. I'm just kidding.

That's not true. But it'll be nice to change it up after a month of metal. So I'm excited. All right. So that's that. Check out Pantheonpodcast.com, where you can find a link to our website. And you can find a ton of other great music podcast content. And that's that.

We'll be back next week for our final metal episode. for the month of October. Actually, technically it'll be November by then, which is nuts. But yeah, where the hell does time go, dude? It marches on. It marches on to the bell.

Exactly. Tolls. Metallica was right. It marches on. All right. That'll do it. My name is Travis. And I'm Quentin.

I'll see y'all later. Simons Sucs. eblouise in a guarderob prepared to celebrate a season.

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with Simons I'm Sophia Loperkero host of the Before the Chorus podcast. We dive into

the life experiences behind the music we love. Artists of all genres are welcome. And I've been joined by some pretty amazing folks like glass animals. I guess that was the idea was to try something personal and see what happened. And Japanese breakfast. I thought that the most surprising thing I could offer was an album about joy. You can listen wherever you get your podcasts. Oh, and remember, so much happens before the chorus. When holiday prep means cleaning every corner, reach for Pine Soul original Pine. Pine Soul is the only one you need for

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