So... Alright - Screams You Can’t Live Without

Episode Date: October 17, 2023

Geoff shares his favorite musical screams. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

So, I'm a sucker for a really good scream in a song. I don't know about you, but the best kind of music for me, and it's probably why I gravitated towards punk and hardcore at a young age, is music where you can really feel the raw and the honest emotion of the musicians. Whether it's present in the guitar riff or whether you can just hear the pain or the truth in what the singer is singing. The most appealing music to me was always, and to this day is still, music where I just feel like I'm there with the band or the musician. And that doesn't have to be punk rock. I think that Lana Del Rey, for instance, has that quality.

When I listen to a Lana Del Rey song, I feel what she's singing. And it feels honest and from the heart. It may be total bullshit. It may be just in the production. But it works, and I feel it. And that's definitely been the case with a lot of the punk and the hardcore music that I've really resonated with in my life. Some of my favorite bands growing up were bands that weren't the best singers or musicians,

but just were the rawest and the most honest and did the best job of translating the emotion behind their music to me as a listener. And to that end, as I said earlier, I'm a sucker for a good scream in a song. And I know that there are some famous songs and some famous musicians with some amazing and intense screams. There's a lot of bands that probably come to your mind or musicians that come to your mind immediately. Like for me, Iron Maiden jumps to the top of the list right now. However, I thought I would highlight three songs from bands that maybe you've heard, maybe not, maybe you've heard them. I don't know. But I think they exemplify that emotion that I'm talking about. So I wanted to highlight not the best, but my three favorite screams and songs.

And maybe you'll like them as well. I don't know. The first one I want to talk about is from a band I have talked about many times in the past, a band called Bikini Kill. They were a Riot Grrrl band from the Pacific Northwest in the early 90s. Lead singer is a woman named Kathleen Hanna, who I have about as much reverence and respect and admiration for as a person can have. Her music was really important to me growing up as I learned about the world and instrumental to me. I think the last Bikini Kill album, Reject All American, is one of the most honest and heartbreaking albums I've ever heard. But this song is not on that. This is from their first...

There's actually a first two records compilation you can get it on. The song is called Liar. And I've talked about it before in podcasts and in content. You may have even heard my ringtone because I had this joke I used to play on myself. I guess I've outgrown it finally. But when I was younger, I always thought it would be funny to have a ringtone that I didn't expect. And if I forgot to put my phone on silent, it could start ringing and cause me embarrassing situations. As probably the worst example I can give you, I was at a parent-teacher conference for my daughter when she was in grade school. And I had recently changed my ringtone to a porn star screaming the phrase dropping loads, which was something that they used to play on the Howard Stern show

all the time that I thought was really gross and funny and jarring, right? And so I thought, how funny would it be if I'm in a meeting or somewhere professional, and then that starts playing and I have to explain my way out of it. And so that actually finally happened during like a third grade parent teacher conference. It was pretty embarrassing, and I was able to get my way out of it. But after that day, I changed my ringtone, and I never used that one again. And I changed it to the scream from the Bikini Kill song, Liar, which you have probably heard. If you've watched a lot of old Rooster Teeth content, it's come up a few times. It is still my ringtone to this day. I think it's maybe the single best scream I've ever heard in a song. If you want to hear it, I'll put it on the Spotify playlist for So Alright. That's public. You can go to our Instagram to find

the link to it. It's in our link tree. or you can just probably search So Alright Podcast on Spotify. It's got all the music we've talked about from previous episodes, and it's going to have all the music we talk about for every episode going forward. It's your one-stop shop to hear all this nonsense. Okay. So anyway, the song... It's a classic feminist right girl song. I'll let you listen to it. You're going to enjoy it. It's a phenomenal song. But at about, oh gosh, I think about a minute and 35 seconds in, there's a breakdown in the song.

And then the scream starts. And it goes for a while. And it's phenomenal. I highly recommend you listen to that song. And I think that you'll, even if you don't like that kind of music, you'll enjoy it. Especially if you listen to the lyrics and you kind of understand what the song is about. Kathleen Hanna, as I said, is a really interesting person if you don't know who she is. She was obviously the front person for Bikini Kill.

She was then in a band called La Tigre, which was kind of like poppy indie dance punk, which was really, really, really good. They were very popular in the late 90s, early 2000s. Then she recorded as Julie Ruin or The Julie Ruin for a while. And she kind of disappeared off the map. I didn't know why. But a few years ago, I watched a documentary about her called The Punk Singer, which is really good, by the way. And I recommend you watching it. I mean, it's pretty old now. It's got to be about 10 years old at this point. But if you watch it, you find out she kind of took a break from her career because she ended up with Lyme disease and had a years and years long battle with Lyme disease. And I think she's come out the other side of it now and even is

performing again. As a matter of fact, I had tickets to go see Bikini Kill in Wisconsin for like a reunion tour. And then the pandemic happened. And obviously, the show got postponed. It was a couple years later before they finally played. And I was just not able. I was too busy, and I wasn't able to go. So I never got to go to that show. I never got to see Bikini Kill live. I hope at some point, they'll come through Texas. They'll play again. Also, interesting thing about her, she's married to Adam Horowitz of the Beastie Boys. If you don't know who that is, that's Ad-Rock from the Beastie Boys. Talk about a very, very cool power couple. One of the coolest and most innovative rappers of an era, and one of the coolest and most innovative feminist musicians

of an era. Pretty awesome pairing. The second song is by a band called The Dismemberment Plan. If you're not familiar with them, they are one of Gus's favorite bands of all time. I don't know if he still listens to them. I don't know if he's still into them. But when Gus and I were kids in our early 20s, he couldn't get enough of this band. He listened to this album, Emergency and I,

over and over and over again. I liked them too, but I liked their older stuff a little bit more. There's an album that's just an exclamation point that I think is pretty rad. And there's a lot of really good music on that album. And obviously, I'm talking about A Song With A Great Scream, but they're kind of an interesting band because I really like their music. And I think that their lyrics are really interesting, but their lyrics make me not like them very much, if that helps. They seem kind of misogynistic. And I know it's music of a time and they're telling stories and through music. And I shouldn't ascribe that necessarily to them as people.

But some of the lyrics are, looking back on it now, pretty toxic. The song I'm talking about is a guy named Travis. I don't know if he's singing about. Well, I guess if he's singing a song as we've got to assume it's him, right? But anyway, he sounds he sounds like a dude I wouldn't want to date. And he sounds kind of like a prick. But I don't know him personally. Maybe he's a lovely dude. I just want to warn you. It's a really, really good song.

But they kind of come across as dickheads in in the song. The song is going to be called OK Jokes Over, and it's about a dude fighting with a woman, I assume, that he was having an affair with, maybe, and she's trying to move on

with her life. She's with someone else, and he's trying to keep stringing her along, and I don't think she's having it. And he's clearly got some self-worth issues and is constantly demanding

some sort of validation from her. And I think it's clearly not getting it. Anyway, the scream comes at three minutes and 47 seconds. There's some good screams throughout the song, but the scream at three minutes and 47 seconds is a top tier S-level scream. You're going to love it. I mean, it's a phenomenal scream. Once again, really good song. Definitely wouldn't want to date the person they're singing about. But nonetheless, it's an awesome song. This episode is brought to you by Peloton. Forget the pressure to be crushing your workout on day one. Just start moving with the Peloton Bike, Bike Plus, Tread, Row, Guide, or App. There are thousands of classes

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What day of the week do you look forward to most? Well, it should be Wednesday. All access memberships separate. Terms apply. way and you won't want to miss it. So make every Wednesday a whopper Wednesday only at Burger King where you rule. An interesting thing about that band. I was doing a little bit of reading up on them. I never I never knew where they got the name dismemberment plan from and I was reading about it and, they were big fans of the movie Groundhog Day. And I guess in that movie, I don't remember the specific scene, but there is a character in the movie that I do remember very well. It's the insurance salesman. His name is Ned Ryerson. And in that movie, at some point, he talks to Bill Murray. He's offering

him or mentions that he has a death and dismemberment plan policy. And I guess Travis, the lead singer, really liked the idea of dismemberment plan as a name. So he went to the band. And I'm reading from an interview with them a few years ago. And he said, they were like, no. Then later, I asked the other guys in the band, and they were like, no. So I ended up making an executive decision. I just liked the name so much. So I guess he has lead singer syndrome and decided to name the band that even though the other members weren't down with it.

Then he goes on to mention that a funny addition to that is that after we recorded our first record, Ian McKay, who if you don't know who Ian McKay is, he invented Straight Edge. He was the lead singer and creator of a band called Minor Threat, which is a hardcore, seminal hardcore band. Then he went on to helm Fugazi, which is one of the greatest bands of the last 30 years. He's in a band called The Evens that's very good. He was in the early punk band called The Teen Idols. He was in a project called Egg Hunt, called egg hunt embrace put out one album that's

fucking classic if it came out between minor threat and fugazi and embrace kind of filled because they're very different bands if you've ever heard minor threat and you've ever heard fugazi they sound very different minor threat is very straightforward straight edge hardcore just pure anger and emotion and fug Fugazi is this discordant, musically complex amalgamation of different musical styles that falls into the punk genre, I guess, but is so, so, so much more.

And they became so experimental as they got towards the end of their recording career and just really at the end started to pump out some really phenomenal music. Anyway, I can't recommend anything Ian McKay does enough, but this is not about Ian McKay. This is about Ian McKay telling Travis, the lead singer of The Dismemberment Plan, that they should change the name. He didn't like it. And Travis said, he was a negative Nelly and I want the world to know that. I got no problem with the name

Dismemberment Plan, but if everybody in your life is telling you it's not a good idea, including the Ian McKay, I don't know, maybe listen a little bit. Hard to argue with the fact that this band was called the Dismemberment Plan and they were around for many, many years and had many albums and had great success. So I guess ultimately he was right to name it. And it's his band. You can name it whatever you want. I don't personally have an issue with the name Dismemberment Plan. I don't think it's any better or any worse than most band names. I just think it's interesting that nobody wanted him to name the band that and he did it anyway. I guess that's, I mean, I guess he had a vision, right? You got to respect that. in Groundhog Day. Ned Ryerson, that character, is played by a phenomenal character actor by the name of Stephen Tobolowsky. And I don't know if you've heard of Stephen Tobolowsky, but you've seen him.

I guarantee you. And you will recognize him immediately. He has been in more than 200 films and television shows. He's been all over the stage. He's Tony nominated. He kind of came into some popularity. I remember in the early to mid 2000s, there was this website I used to read a lot of called Slash Film. In the early days, or I would say the middling days of Rooster Teeth, when I was running Achievement Hunter and Let's Play, and we were making, you know, 15 or 16 hours of edited content a week, I felt like I needed to be able to talk on a multitude of subjects. And a lot of what we did was centered in pop culture and what was popular or current or interesting in the day. And so I considered it a part of my job to know

as much as I could about film and games and TV and cartoons and anything that I could get my hands on, because I wanted to be able to talk on a variety of subjects because we had so much space to fill. And so I read this website, Slashfilm, a lot because I felt like I needed to be abreast on all the latest info and news so that I could speak semi-intelligently about it. Anyway, Tobolowsky, through Slashfilm, back in like, I don't know, 2009, 2010, maybe he started a podcast called the Tobolowsky files where he would just tell stories from his career in Hollywood. He's a fairly gifted storyteller. And he's been in, like I said, so many different things. I'm just looking at his credits right now. And he's been in hundreds upon hundreds upon hundreds of

things. And he has that face. As soon as you see him, you're like, oh, that's the guy with diabetes and memento who had his wife keep giving him the shot and didn't realize that he was dying and she didn't believe him. That dude. Yeah, he's I mean, he's been in a million things. Anyway, if you ever get a chance, listen to the Tobolowsky files because it's pretty interesting and he's got some crazy stories from his career. And I wonder if he has any idea that a really popular 2000s indie band was named after him. Well, indirectly, named after a line that he said. Okay, and last but definitely not least is a Dead Kennedys song that I think a lot of people probably haven't even heard. Jelly Be Off and the Dead Kennedys

had a huge, awesome hit on their hands with the song California Uber Alice. You've probably heard that song. It was one of the biggest Dead Kennedy songs. It was a takedown of California Governor Jerry Brown, and it was very catchy and very popular. But in 1984, what you may not know is they released a sequel to that song on an album called Plastic Surgery Disasters in God We Trust Incorporated. And on that album is a reworking of that classic song, California Uber Alice, but it's called We've Got a Bigger Problem Now. And it's an updated version of the song that's no longer about Jerry Brown in California. It's actually kind of funny. I read an interview with Jello Biafra about it.

And he actually said, I realized I was wrong about my conspiracy theory about Jerry Brown. Sure, I'd made it up all by myself, and it turned out not to be true. So it was updated with Reagan lyrics, which I think is really funny. He had created this conspiracy theory in his head about Jerry Brown that was completely and totally invented. And I don't know much about California politics, but I know that Jerry Brown became a pretty beloved and long tenured governor of that state. And I think a pretty popular dude. Anyway, so they rerecord the song in 84 about Reagan becoming president. They changed the title to We've Got a Bigger Problem Now.

It's pretty much the same song, except it's like a jazzy, like lounge, singy, talky kind of thing that they've done. It's gimmicky and it's a little silly and a little over the top, but it's kind of goofy, but it's also catchy and it's good

and it's fun. I don't know that you would listen to it as much as, say, California Uber Alice, but if you do listen to it and you get to about a minute and 45 seconds, you're going to hear

Jello Biafra deliver one of the all-time greatest screams in a song you've ever heard. It is truly wonderful, and it's the one I've been listening to. I've been listening to this song since I was 15 years old. I fell in love with that scream when I was 15 years old. It is actually the scream that I base all other song screams on. It's the scream where I discovered, oh,. It is actually the scream that I base all other song screams on. It's the scream where I discovered, oh, I really like a good scream in the middle of a song. I want to find more of these. It's the one that I hold up all other screams to. I think that, you know, probably the Bikini Kill song is the best I've ever heard, but this is the first and definitely one of the coolest. And if you want to get a little depressed, read the lyrics or pay special attention to

the lyrics of We've Got a Bigger Problem Now, written all the way back in 1984, and marvel at how incredibly pertinent they are to today. I would say he was prescient, but he wasn't he wasn't portending a dark, distant future. He was pretending the immediate problems of of 1984. But here we are in 2023 and the lyrics still they seem incredibly current, which is I don't know if it's comforting that, you know, in 2023, we're we're not we don't have new problems. We've essentially still got the same problems we had in 1984. Or if it's super fucking depressing that the problems we have in 2023 feel like a slightly worse version of the problems we had in 1984. And we seem to have gotten nowhere. Um, I know we have,

I know we have, I know we've made progress. I know we continue to make progress and we will continue to make progress, but, uh, man, 84 to 2023, the lyrics fit. So there you go. Three awesome screams from three awesome songs from three awesome bands. You can listen to them on the So Alright Spotify playlist. Let me know what you think in an email to eric at jeffsboss.com. If you have some recommendations for favorite screams you've ever heard of in songs that I may or may not have heard myself, I'd love to hear your recommendations. As always, I've been thinking about this a lot, but I think it would be fun to build out a separate playlist with the audience of music that you recommend to me. Because people have been sending me so many recommendations, really good and interesting recommendations.

I feel like I want to highlight them. I can probably do it in an episode someday, but I think maybe we'll just create another playlist, uh, that, you know, is populated just by music you recommend to me. And then, uh, by proxy,

I recommend back to you. All right.