Switched on Pop - The New Alternative

Episode Date: April 26, 2022

Last month, Nirvana entered the Billboard Hot 100 chart for the first time in nearly two decades — only their fifth time in history — thanks to a comic-book movie. The band’s 1991 track “Something in the Way” was heavily featured in The Batman, whose director, Matt Reeves, said Nirvana front man Kurt Cobain inspired Robert Pattinson’s brooding performance as the caped crusader. Plus, Cobain’s music influenced the film’s score: Michael Giacchino references the dirge-like chords of “Something in the Way,” borrowed from Chopin’s famous funeral march, throughout The Batman’s soundtrack. While these musical motifs obviously pair well with the inner turmoil of a fledgling Batman, the sound is part of a larger revival of “alternative” music. The DIY aesthetic of ’90s alternative, heard in the music of young stars like Olivia Rodrigo and Willow, is a pendulum swing from electronic-laden sounds of the last decade. And the genre’s anti-corporate perspective, which developed out of the excesses of the ’80s, is a fitting backdrop to contemporary activist attitudes. From the nostalgia of Beabadoobee, to the post-rock sounds of Wet Leg, to the industrial sonics of Halsey’s latest project, new artists are using alternative’s old sounds to shape the sound of contemporary pop. On the latest episode of Switched on Pop, Nate and Charlie scan the alternative radio and streaming charts for standout songs that trace this umbrella genre’s myriad sounds and influences. More Read Justin Curto's article 2021 Killed the Myth that Rock Ever Died Songs Discussed (playlist) Nirvana - Something In The Way, Heart-Shaped Box Frédéric Chopin, Leif Ove Andsnes - Chopin: Piano Sonata No. 2 in B-Flat Minor, Op. 35 “Funeral March” Michael Giacchino - Can’t Fight City Hallowwen Beabadoobee - Care Hole - Celebrity Skin Tracy Bonham - Mother Mother Wheatus - Teenage Dirtbag Blink-182 - I Miss You Wet Leg - Chaise Longue The Slits - Typical Girls Halsey - I am not a woman, I’m a god Nine Inch Nails - Closer Trent Reznor and Atticus Ross - Intriguing Possibilites Machine Gun Kelly, Lil Wayne - ay! Lil Wayne, Nicki Minaj - Knockout Willow ft. Siickbrain - PURGE Evanescence - Bring Me To Life Deftones - My Own Summer (Shove It) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

If you're tired of endless scrolling to figure out where to eat, same. I'm Stephanie Wu, editor-in-chief of Eater. We've just launched the new-ish and way better Eater app. It has all the restaurants we love, gives you personalized picks wherever you are, and serves up smarter search results just for you. You can find my list of the best places for martinis and fries in New York City. And save your favorite spots, share lists, follow editors, and book right in the app. the eater app at eater app.com. It's free for iOS users. Welcome to Switched on Pop. I'm songwriter Charlie Harding.

And I'm musicologist Nate Sloan. Nate, a few weeks back in March 2022, funny thing happened. On the way to the forum. What? Oh, zingers. I got zingers today. I have no idea what that means. Another reference that has left you shell shocked, similar to my combination Pizza Hut and Taco Bo reference from our last show. I'm really out of it. But you know it's not out of it? Oh, good segue. is the 90s grunge band Nirvana back in March, enters Billboard's Hot 100 for only the fifth time in history. Really? With their song, something in the way. Uh-huh.

Do you have any idea why the song came back? I believe it's featured in the soundtrack to the moody latest installment of the Batman franchise. Yeah, it's very fitting because it is this sort of noir, very dark. dark take on Batman. And the song has a very cinematic quality to it because it might remind you of another very dark motif. Ooh, it might, but it doesn't. Did not see that coming.

This is Frederick Chopin, the funeral march from the B-flat major piano sonata. Did I get there right? Flat major, you said. B flat major? B flat minor, Nate. Oh, man, that's... Musicology PhD revoked. Are you sure it?

Wait, no, but are you sure the sonata's not in B flat major and that particular movement's in B flat minor? Nope, it's B flat minor, isn't it? Yeah. Well, I had a good run. It's been fun. Switched on pop. The end.

No, no, okay. I need a new intro, former disgraced musicologist. Disgraced musicologist. Okay, so just to isolate it with something in the way, you've got this dark harmonic motif. The adjective dirge-like comes to mind. And in the Chopin, it's the same thing, just in a different key. That's some deep analysis, Chuck. This dark motif is so embedded in our cultural understanding of darkness, this funeral march, that, as I said, it's cinematic, and it actually,

folds its way into the Batman's soundtrack. You can hear it in the bell. It really seems like a for whom the bell tolls. Boom, boom. Very menacing. Very menacing. Very ominous. Wait, so you're saying the Batman isn't like this cheery, feel-good, escapist, like, rom-com?

I totally misunderstood the premise of that film. No, that was the George Clooney Arnold Schwarzenegger version from decades ago. Which deeply shaped my childhood. Okay, it all makes sense now. Maybe unfortunately, I think new childhoods are being formed around this Batman film, which is quite dark and uses this very melancholic theme that was fitting in the 90s when Nirvana played it. This is an era coming out of the exorcist of the 80s where you see a newfound activism and anti-corporatism, a very sort of give-no F's attitude and DIY aesthetic, where new music first called grunge.

captivates audiences and eventually becomes extremely popular known as this sort of meta category of alternative music. Alternative presumably to the manufactured corporate pop hits of the top 40. That's right. Yeah. Okay. And in addition to Nirvana being back in the spotlight for a minute, alternative music is having a moment again. Our colleague Justin Kirto at Vulture had a great article all about the ways that rock. based music is having a comeback, but especially alternative. You have artists like Olivia Rodriguez and Willis Smith who are referencing 90s alternative music to change the sound of contemporary pop.

And so today I want to do a chart breakers episode where we pick standout songs off the charts that are doing something interesting. We're going to look at the alternative charts to try to take a tour of the wide variety of sounds contained in the probably overly broad umbrella of alternative. And here are some things that might surprise us. I'm so down. I got five songs for you. Okay. The first one is from singer B. Christie goes by Biba Dooby.

She's got a song, Care, went to number 18 on U.S. Alternative Airplay. Start Slow, verse with acoustic guitar, mellow voice. Builds into this, what she calls an angry girl anthem. The chorus busts out with... thrashing electric guitars. That's really fun. When I first heard this, I was like, oh my gosh, that sound is instantly familiar. What is it?

What is that thing that they're doing? I'm not sure, but it transports me back to the 1990s in a powerful way. Yeah, there's this musical thing that they do in the chorus. It's that kind of stop time thing. Yeah, maybe a disgraced musicologist could tell us what the actual technical term is. Well, I don't know. I'm not, you know, I don't know anything anymore. I'm not sure. I think of it kind of like a headbang stop. It's like you're head banging along to the music. The instruments all hit, drop out at the moment you kind of like hold your head in the air,

hair flying forward. Vocalist makes this bold pronouncement. Yeah. In jazz, it would be called stop time, where you have the band does like a hard hit and then there's silence for one instrument to do something, and then another hit and then silence. But we do need an appropriately alternative term for it. And sure. Okay, so head bang stop. Head bang stop.

We'll keep it for now. Either way, I was racking my brain for where have I heard this before? And it actually brought me back to Nirvana. Their song, Heart Shape, Box from 1993. Hmm. opens in a similar, very mellow kind of way. And then it breaks out in full force anger. Very cool, Chuck.

I mean, it's slightly different. The Biba Doobie is a full, there's full silence there for the vocal after the chung-chunk. Like, so it's not so slightly different. It's not a full headbang stop in Nirvana. It's a head-bang pause or something. I'm not done here. It turns out that this head-bang. Dang, stop slash pause thing.

Still looking for a better term. Phone lines are open. It's a total cliche of alternative music. A cliche I happen to really enjoy. Okay. Take me down the rabbit hole. Holes celebrity's skin. Tracy Bonham's mother, mother.

And Weidas's teenage dirtbag. Da, da, da, ah, is the sound of the 90s. Dada, ow. Dada. Teenage dirt bag. was your 2000, but I think that your analysis may be bringing you back into your degree, maybe a little bit less of a disgraced musicologist. I don't need your condescension, Charlie. Don't patronize me. But do tell me more about this alt rock revival. All right, my absolute favorite

song that's happening anywhere right now is I actually don't know how to say it. It's by the band, wet leg. And it's either Chez Lounge or maybe Ches Lounge. Another very fun track you brought us. It is a fun song. And it's getting pickup. It went to 14 on the U.S. Alternative Airplay

chart. They're formed by a duo from the Isle of White, Rianne Teesdale and Hester Chambers, two college friends. They'd been in and out of bands. They just wanted to make something that was delightful, a little irreverent,

like their name, Wet Leg. I think it might be one of the worst band names ever, which makes it that much better. It's a regional insult for off-islanders. And the music is this DIY post-punk kind of vibe that doesn't take itself too seriously. I don't have much I can say more about it because I was left speechless the first time I heard it.

I agree with all your impressions and accolades. And I'm curious if you hear this reaching, back to a particular alt rock reference of your. It reminds me a bit of the slits, the song Typical Girls. The slits are a London-based 70s post-punk group. Obviously not alternative, but I really think that the framing of the word alternative is fundamentally flawed and doesn't actually mean a lot. It just is the thing which is the other thing, which is kind of in the rock world.

Ah. So we're here to, let me regain some of my academic credentials for a minute. We're here to destabilize, problematize, unpack, perhaps, the very definition of alt-rock. We might achieve that by the end of that episode when we listen to some more songs. But in the case of Wetleg and the Slits, I like how both of them are playing with ideas of female decorum, flipping this script on overtly sexual music in a very humorous way. I've really been enjoying this wet leg track, so I'm glad we had the opportunity to discuss it. What else do you have up your sleeve in terms of modern songs referencing historic alt rock? I've got three more, and number two is going to surprise you. I'll tell you right after a quick break. No! Attention, Spotify. Has arrived at the new Good Girl Jasmine Absolut of Carolina Herrera,

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bar records. Chartbreakers, Alt Rock, we're back. Is it the right term? We're going to find out

on this episode of Chartbreakers. Don't do cheat. Doon, jeep. Doon, do chart. Doon, break.

Okay, real talk. The whole alternative thing just, it doesn't really hold up for me because you could say, like, oh, well, it's like a guitar-based music, but then also there's synthesizers. Yeah. There's some, like, drum programming. It's not, it's not defined by a certain kind of acoustic or organic palette. That's not it. It's also not even defined necessarily by being alternative in the sense of not being mainstream. because so many of these alt rock tracks are like hugely commercially successful.

So yeah, what is this term anyway? Well, maybe we can unpack that more with the next song by an artist who is quite mainstream and has made a radical shift to a different sound that we had unfortunately kind of ignored on the show. I'm talking about Halsey and her song, I am not a woman. I'm a god. Went to number six on the U.S. alternative airplay and even up to number 64 on the Hot 100. So this song actually came as a recommendation from our overwhelmingly excellent editor, Julie Myers. She left us a voice note, her thoughts on the track. Something I love about Halsey's vocals on this track is that she maintains an interesting control while still managing to sound raw.

It's like a barely restrained violence. They are not a woman, they're a god. They are not a martyr. they're a problem. And if she chooses to smite you, then it will be a totally rational act. When I was an angry teen, nine-inch nails really hit the spot. But it always had like a real masculine flavor to it. Halsey braids a seething feminine rage into this industrial rock landscape in such a satisfying way. It's unapologetic. Women are sick of saying they're sorry. gods don't have to.

Halsey teamed up with 9-inch nails producers Trent Rezner and Atticus Ross for this record. And it does sound kind of like a mash-up of 9-inch nails closer. You let me violate you. You let me desecrate you. With some of Trent Resner and Atticus Ross's later soundtracking for the film Social Network. But I like what Halsey's is.

doing with this sound. They're taking that frustration that you can hear in the sonics of the industrial production, but taking away that very undeniably masculine sound that you can hear in Nine Inch Nail's Work. And it makes sense because they described this project as a concept album about the joys and horrors of pregnancy and childbirth. Halsey was pregnant during the project. Yeah, some of the electronic production textures here are little sinister, like a little menacing even. But then as Jolie said, there's something about Halsey's voice that is at once very commanding. And also there are those kind of cracks in it, too.

All of which as a listener makes me feel really kind of uneasy in a very compelling way. I think that's appropriate because the song is dealing with this duality of being a woman or a god. And as Jolie says, we can hear it in her voice. In fact, in the chorus, there's almost two halsey's singing in completely different styles at the same time. The first voice in their lower register has this authority to it. But singing over themselves is the screaming voice. And then in the bridge, the screaming voice isolates. And Nate, what's wild is that that duality isn't just in how she sings the vocal.

It's also in how the harmony and melody intersect in the music. Because the song, I would argue, isn't a minor key. The main chords are minor. Yeah. Minor. And then I have to learn the riff again. Yeah. Yeah.

So when that minor chord progression is playing, it clashes against this major. descending melodic line, leaving us in this uncertain place of tonality in the same way that Halsey is confronting their own struggle with identity. Well, I dig that, Charles. Well, this is very illuminating. Gives us another glimpse of what alternative rock might mean in the 2020s. Let's try another one.

Let's do it. All right. We've got Machine Gun Kelly with Lil Wayne. I knew it was coming. Got a song. It was inevitable. A? I? A? Are you okay? What just happened? What, what, no, no, no, what just, what was that?

A. I'm trying to say the name of the song. It's AIA. It's A.I.A. It's A. Y, exclamation point. A. From Canada. A. Y. Exclamation point. That's I. I. I. I. I. It's number six on the alternative streaming song charts. A, hey, hey, hey. Nope, it was A. It was A all along. It was A all along. And it is a song that gets to what we were talking about just a second ago where the boundaries of genre and titling things alternative. Yeah, right.

You know, I think what we're really breaking here is just the idea of the alternative charts. But here they are. So we're going to stick to it. This is a song that is like three different styles all put together. You've got Machine Gun Kelly, who is the rapper, singer, musician, actor, tablied fodder, multi-hyphen-it, pairing up with rapper Lil Wayne and producer Travis Barker, the drummer from Blink 182. I think he's on all of the songs on the Hot 100 at the given moment, producing in the background. And the opening of A has the sadness of a Blink 182 pop punk kind of song. I wrote a letter to myself in the form of a song I can play when the sun shines

reminds me of a track like I miss you So you've got the Travis Barker Blink 182 kind of vibe But then on A 17 seconds into the song we get trap 808s and hi-hat sounds And this is very fitting because the world of emo rap, which combines these styles, is very popular at the moment. And we get a rap verse from Lil Wayne himself. It's cool to hear Little Wayne on this track because I feel like he was such a pioneer of this sound, this alt-rock emo meets hip-hop blend right back. Back in 2010, he released an album Rebirth.

That was a rock album, and he just defied all the expectations and all the haters. It turned out to be very prescient, I think, because now so many hip-hop artists are borrowing the language of emo and alt-rock, and so many alt-rockers are borrowing the language of hip-hop. So these two genres have met in the middle in this really interesting way. and here's Little Wayne, the progenitor, like, lending his stamp of approval to Machine Gun Kelly. I'm into it. And I think you're wise to point this one out because when Lil Wayne put that record out, it was not the sound of hip hop. No.

It was definitely an out there kind of move, a very alternative kind of move, if you will. He got so much flack and people making fun of him. It's, man, but he was so ahead of the curve, in fact. Yeah. Yeah, totally. Okay, maybe for our final pick, a song that actually hasn't quite made it to the charts yet. But I, too, think it's maybe on the bleeding edge or something. This is Willow's song, Purge with Sick Brain.

Love Willow. I probably wouldn't have said this until we did a whole episode devoted to breaking down Willow's single of Travis Barker, Transparent Soul. but I can say avowedly, I'm a fan of Willow, and this track does not disappoint. She has found a way to channel all the best parts of alternative music and make them speak to people today. Yeah, you've got like new metal-y stuff, hardcore, emo, very post-genre. I like that it opens with that heavy guitar riff and that spoken vocal.

But when we get to the chorus, the whole song, bursts out. I'm curious if you hear any forebears. Nate, you just gave me a total Muppet face. Could you describe your reaction? It's guttural, intense metal, screaming. It's like pulling out demons from deep inside your soul and exercising them for the world. But you want a very specific musical reference, and I can't provide that for you.

I hear at least two. I capture this sort of smooth, legato hookiness, this pop sensibility that reminds me of evanescence, bring me to life. Okay, I'll bite. And then how about the screaming bit that you caught? That reminds me of the sort of like alt metal, new metal sounds of the deaf tones, a song like My Own Summer. Yep. It's hard to do that.

Screaming like that takes a lot of control and practice. Very cool to hear that. Willow. Wow. What can't she do? Well, what she hasn't done yet is breaking to the charts with Purge, though she seems to be everywhere else on the charts with plenty of other music. But this one caught my ear, so I would like to see it continue to mess up our idea of what alternative music might mean. Because today we have talked about industrial stuff.

We've talked about screaming things. We've talked about emo things. We've talked about a reverent postpun, and we started off with the Batman. I mean, that's very encouraging, right? Like, we don't want to box genres in and narrow them and consolidate them. We want to expand them and explode them. And it's cool that artists are doing that. So what you're saying is that your academic methodologies might still serve a purpose here on the show?

I quote you, you said I was wise earlier. Can I still call myself a musicologist? Nate, I doth you Your academic cap of musicalogical expertise You have earned your cloak Is that way you guys use cloaks and weird hats and things? It's very medieval cult-like It's hood and gown, not a cloak

You're still in Batman, I think. I did not go to graduate school. I appreciate it. I'm going to listen to some wet leg right now. This episode of Switched on Pop was edited by Jolie Myers. Thank you for the wonderful voice note. Engineered by Brandon McFarland and Chris Shirtleff. Illustrations by Iris Gottlieb, community management by Abby Barr,

our executive producers of a shot car on Hama Rosen, a member of the Vox Media Podcast Network and a production of Vulture. You can find more episodes of our show, anywhere you listen to podcasts, as well as our website, switchedonpop.com. We're on Twitter and Instagram at Switched on Pop,

and we're dying to know what your favorite contemporary tracks that hearken back to the glory days of what was once called Alt Rock until we referred this episode. So hit us up there, and Charlie, do you have a playlist that you're going to share with the good people?

I'll post all the songs from this episode and a playlist on social media and come back again, next Tuesday. We're going to be speaking with one of Nate's college rock favorite bands, Bell and Sebastian. It's going to be a lot of fun. And until then, thanks for listening.