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- [00:00]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Foreign.
- [00:06]
Scott Bertram
Everybody. And welcome into another edition of Political Beats, a presentation of National Review. Find us on X at Political Underscore Beats. We're also over on Facebook as well. Subscribe to the feed for new episodes through Apple Podcasts or where you find your audio also right there@nationalreview.com listen there, leave reviews where possible, help other people find the program and if you really love us, you will join us over@patreon.com Politicalbeats support the program, help it stay ad free as it has been entry level Support there for early voting or not early voting, voting privileges on a few things. Mid level for early access to our shows and at a higher audio quality. And our upper level best friends, they get it all. Early access, higher audio quality, Monthly exclusive content, episodes, remastered episodes, playlists and more all can be found at patreon.com politicalbeats now the part of the program where we thank individually some of our longtime and short time supporters over@patreon.com politicalbeats thanks to Alex Poterack, Timothy Cobb, Peter Berklund, Ian R. Brown, Isaac Barkus, Chris McCall, Adam Banker, Ken Finley, John Muller and William Gaffey, all longtime supporters of our work here at Political Beats. You can join them at patreon.com politicalbeats My name is Scott Bertram. You can find me on X at Scott Bertram, my tag team partner. Standing by as always, Jeff Blair. Jeff, how are you?
- [01:55]
Jeff Blair
Oh, I'm doing great, Scott. I got the heck out of Chicago. You know, it's kind of, it's been so miserable around here lately with all the fireworks and whatnot. I moved myself up to the Pacific Northwest. I've traded in my, my short sleeve shirts for a set of flannels and, and I guess my bright disposition for a sullen mood. I also reserved this really cool practice space in Olympia. Cool.
- [02:17]
Scott Bertram
Well, so much rain recently in Chicago. It felt like you were in the Pacific Northwest. Indeed, Jeff is on X at Esoteric cd. Our guest on today's program is managing editor of the Lamp, a Catholic literary journal. You can find it@thelamp magazine.com also. And Jeff, correct me if I'm wrong, but holds the high honor of being the first husband wife combination to guest on Political Beats.
- [02:51]
Jeff Blair
Oh, so I was about to say, is that Hannah's husband? It turns out it is.
- [02:55]
Scott Bertram
It is. I always thought it would be Mark and Molly Hemingway, but have not convinced Molly to do the show yet. So it's Nick and Hannah Rowan. Nick Rowan is here today. Nick, how are you doing?
- [03:05]
Nick Rowan
All right. And I'M shocked to hear that we beat the Hemingways. They seem like they're the husband wise combo for everything.
- [03:15]
Jeff Blair
Well, we've had Mark on three times already, so he's an MVP guest.
- [03:19]
Scott Bertram
He's done his, he's pulled his share.
- [03:21]
Nick Rowan
It's.
- [03:21]
Scott Bertram
It's Molly's fault. Nick, tell people a little bit about you and the Lamp and, and what you do.
- [03:30]
Nick Rowan
Well, I guess about me. I live in Washington D.C. i work with my wife Hannah in a editing capacity. We have two kids at the Lamp. I am the managing editor as Scott mentioned, which means it's a two man shop. So we've got the editor and he's in charge and the managing editor and he does what the editor tells him to do. That's my job is making the trains run on time.
- [04:05]
Scott Bertram
And you can find more@thelampmagazine.com some really good essays posted there over over time. Nick, you're here to talk about a band Jeff alluded to as he always does in our intro, one that I had a fairly good familiarity with and do a couple of albums very well. But much like Jeff was interested in diving in feet first and taking it all in. A band that's very influential and very well known in a band that's still around, in fact, in a slightly different form. This is Slater Kinney today on Political Beats. Nick, we turn the floor back to you to tell us why you like Slater Kinney, how you found out about him, and why anyone else should care about this music we're going to talk about today.
- [05:00]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
She's worried, she's worried she's worried she said too much and talking and talking. She's talking like books are friends. Shut yourself off Never off the record It'll never shine.
- [05:41]
Nick Rowan
So I think, Scott, you can correct me if I'm wrong, but I think all three of us came to this band a little bit later than their peak. I guess it's useful for me to begin with numbers here. I was in utero when their, I guess their breakout album, Dig Me Out, I guess you could say the one before that called the Doctor, was like a small breakout album. But their bigger one, Dig Me out, came out in 1997 and I was in my mom's tummy at the time. I was in third grade when the band broke up in 2006. So like a lot of people my age, the first way I heard about Slater Kenny was through the TV show Portlandia. Yes. Which, you know, it has its moments, but it's not like my favorite TV show. I Think I listened to the woods, which was the last album before the breakup in high school, but it didn't really make an impression on me. It was really only a few years ago that I was ready for the band.
- [06:48]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
In one more hour I will be gone in one more hour I leave this room that dress you wore that pretty shoes all things I left behind for you oh, you got the darkest night oh, you got the dark.
- [07:45]
Nick Rowan
I was in Seattle for a tour of a human composting facility. I was. I was writing about this for the lamp. I was not, you know, scoping out something for myself, but basically, this is a very particular kind of Pacific Northwestern thing where when you die, you can pay to have your body put in a large compost bin, you know, rolled over and over, over. Over the course of a month and turned into dirt. And I. I flew out there early in the morning to. To go see this facility. And the tour was in the evening, so I had a lot of time to kill during the day. And then afterward when I was done, it. You know, it wasn't even dark out. It was. It was summer in Washington. So, you know, you have the. The. The beautiful light streaming down into your car as you just can't sleep. Um, it's like. It's like the. The Christopher Nolan movie in Alaska where Robert De Niro can't sleep.
- [08:48]
Jeff Blair
Insomnia.
- [08:49]
Scott Bertram
Insomnia.
- [08:50]
Nick Rowan
Or is that out? Is it. Is it Al Pacino?
- [08:52]
Scott Bertram
It's Pacino. Pacino and Robin Williams.
- [08:54]
Jeff Blair
Robin Williams plays the murderous guy.
- [08:56]
Nick Rowan
That's right. Yeah. Yeah, that's. That is a fantastic movie. But anyway, that was me. I was Pacino. And so I decided, what the hell? I've got all this time. I'm going to drive from Seattle to Olymp, and it's, like, not that far away. But to keep myself awake, I decided to put on, you know, local bands from the 90s. And my wife Hannah, who has been on this show before, was very into Kathleen. Hannah at the time. So I tried out Bikini Kill and found that that was not my cup of tea. Not. Not really to my taste at all. Somehow or another, you know, just going down the rabbit hole of, like, well, who else got their start in Olympia? I found Slater, Kenny. I remembered them, of course, and I put on Dig Me Out. And the band has never really been out of rotation since. They're awesome. And I. I think the reason why I got into them is that all three of the core members are just total professionals. They're there for the music and they're there to play off of each other in ways that is fascinating. I think Corinne Tucker has a totally unique voice. She just wails and screams in a way that is really great when you're in a car. And the way that Carrie Brownstein plays off of her there is. Is really fascinating. And then the fact that they have, you know, two guitars that are playing off of each other is also a lot of fun. And then their, their longtime drummer, Janet Weiss just, you know, put. She holds them together but then pushes every song forward. I don't know. So it's, it's a very conversational band with lots of shouting and banging also. That's, that's what I like.
- [11:04]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
I'm running out Daddy says I got my mama's mouth I'm on the mountain for dark and empty house I'm all running out Daddy says I got my mama in love I'm all about the fourth dark and after the house shines like this. Things we say 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7.
- [11:51]
Scott Bertram
Nick's a little wrong in that I, I didn't come to them, didn't come to Slater Kenny past their peak. I actually came to them in the right smack dab in the middle of their career because as so many of my stories go from the late 90s and early aughts, I was at the campus radio station, so I heard a whole bunch of music coming through, and I think I might have heard I want to be your Joey Ramone at some point. It's a very familiar song to me, but I didn't really know Slater Kinney until All Hands on the Bad one was released, which is 2000. And at the radio station we played you're no rock and roll Fun, which is a great song. And it's, it's, it's. It served a purpose because at the, at that time we had a program director and a music director, and my, I got a little background here. My college station was a little different than most college stations in that we were not free form. We were formatted. We had a, we had a format. We had playlists. You were expected to, to, to play the songs on the playlist because we were preparing you for a job in professional media. And, you know, if you get a job at a commercial radio station in Chicago, Louisiana, New York, wherever you go, you don't get to pick the songs you play. At least a vast majority of them. You play what's on the playlist. And so we had playlists in college, but we had this big book of songs. Big, big book of songs you could choose from a couple of times an hour or take requests on the phone lines, right? So that was the huge catalog of songs. And we had a program director and a music director who were intent on squeezing that playlist down, making the playlist tighter, making the available songs much tighter, and taking a lot of the college out of a college radio station, just meaning taking that variety and the weirdness out of the available options to play. And there was not a mutiny or revolt, but certainly a pushback from a lot of people who worked on the radio station. And so we went in and did this sort of, not a parody, but sort of an audio shot across the bow, which was a compilation of stuff. And some of our liners we changed to say different things. But the core song that we used to sort of soundtrack it was. You're no rock and roll fun. You always want to play the same old song. Come on, play another song. And so that song has always had a very, very big part in my memories of that time. And it's a fantastic song.
- [14:39]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
All the boys in the band know how to get down fill our Christmas socks. Whiskey dix and chocolate box when the evening ends we won't be thinking of you. You're the best man don't hang out with the girl, bang the girl ban you know rock and roll fun like a piece of art that no one can touch. Your head's always up in the clouds writing your songs won't you ever calm down? All the boys in the band know how to get down Fill our Christmas socks with whiskey drinks and chocolate bars when the evening ends we won't thinking of you there Even if your song is playing on the cheap.
- [15:28]
Scott Bertram
So that I came in with all hands on the bad one. One beat came afterwards, as you'll hear later, I, I think the world of one beat. Fantastic record. After the Woods, I, I kind of have that. Had this band at arm's length where I, I, I, I read the stories. I knew the narrative, I knew the reunion. I, I knew when Weiss was. Was not kicked out, I guess, but resigned, Right? Yeah, I knew all that stuff, but didn't listen. I maybe gave all that stuff a single run through, and so now I have the opportunity to go through and listen again. And the early stuff, the first two albums, I had barely heard whatsoever. So, again, sort of accepting this. This challenge in a way to go back and try to take the scope of Slater Kinney's career was one I really wanted to tackle. So I would know. And as Nick alluded to I think one of the neat things about Slater Kinney is there's any number of different reasons why you might like them. And it might be different from why I might like them. You might love Janet Weiss and she's just an ace drummer. You might like that interweaving of guitars. You might like the fact there's no bass. You might hate the fact there's no bass. You might like the fact it's an all girl group. You might really like the singing. Maybe you don't like. Like there are all these different aspects of in their career and they're not pigeonholed album to album by an exact sound or even an exact approach. And so there always is a little bit of morphing and transitioning between some of these works. But they do have a really keen ear for a hook. They have a keen ear especially later on in the career, I think, for writing really good choruses. And they're all fantastic musicians. I think no matter where you sort of come in to Slater Kinney, you'll probably find a period of their career that you really like.
- [17:39]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Call me up Christina. Wish her under your eyes.
- [18:12]
Jeff Blair
And again I come in, as I often do on this show. I come into this episode as the complete new. And I wasn't ignorant in the way I'm sometimes now. There are. There are certain episodes on the show and we've discussed them where like I didn't even know the name of the Old 97s as a band before we ever discovered there were. I discovered their music and it turned out to be one of the, you know, the most wonderful things I ever got out of Political Beats. Similarly, the dismemberment plan, another 90s group and on one with a much more similar sound. Slater Kenny did not know about them. I don't I a band I shouldn't have missed back in high school and in college, growing up in Washington D.C. no less, didn't know about them. Slater Kenny I knew about. And it wasn't just because of Portlandia. That would have been the later sort of rediscovery of them. I knew about them by reputation. I knew about them because, you know, I was into at that time in the 90s. Now you have to understand during their early peak, in their early heyday, I was still that Beatles only 60s rock phase. You know what you just couldn't avoid, especially if you happen to be a Kinks fan in high school, could not avoid? Dig me out seeing it in the racks. Every time I would see that record I would just. I would catch. And I would have to stop and go back and examine it because it's a straight tribute to a really famous. And Kinks album, a really great cover of theirs called the Kink Controversy. The same framing and look, and it just seems so mysterious. You had to wonder what's on that record.
- [19:44]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Got it.
- [20:16]
Jeff Blair
But I never found out. I never got a chance to listen to it. I was already. I was obsessed with other things. And then I think there was a point at which, you know, I was like, maybe I should get into them. And, boy, this is the thing you always feel embarrassed about confessing. I was a little allergic to their critical praise. I look at a guy like Robert Chris Cow, really great critic. We've mentioned him many times in this show. He gives every single Slater Kenny album like, an A minus or an A plus. And at point, he starts writing reviews that feel more like fan letters. So it's you, you. You kind of like. Is the media criticism about these people overhyped? I didn't know anything. I hadn't heard any of the songs. But I was suspicious in that reflexive way I always get when I see somebody hail this next big thing. The Strokes, classic example of a band I felt that way about. We talked about that on a recent episode. So I didn't really ever get to hear Slater Kenny. And now that I hear them, it's one of those things where you just sort of like, slap yourself upside the forehead and say, why was out on all of this for so long,
- [21:42]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Everyone?
- [21:58]
Jeff Blair
I hear so many musical influences in them without them sounding derivative. Obviously, the most clear ones are just, I hear Sonic Youth all over this group. And I don't know how much of a fan Scott is or Eunick are a fan of Sonic Youth, but I could just go chapter and verse on how some of these songs almost feel like direct tributes to the greats, to the great moments from that band's history. The other one, I hear so much of his Pavement. I mean, these, these. And of course, maybe every great band of the 90s has to have a certain Pavement, you know, scholarship period where, like, Spoon had those first two albums that sound a lot like Pavement and then they found their voice was a very similar thing. That happens with Slater Kenny. They have those first two that are really promising, but they don't really arrive until, you know, Dig Me out, which is sort of like the beginning. It's like their version of Girls Can Tell in a lot of ways. I really love all the other influences I hear on this group, like, from Susie and the Banshees to Exeon Cervenka of X. That's definitely a vocal styling that Corinne Tucker takes from them. And I can just find myself completely able to shrug off the critical rep. I mean, maybe these people were over talked about, maybe they were maybe overpraised in their day, but my God, you can see why people fell in love with this endlessly melodic, well constructed. They've got this calm response vocal thing going on the interweaving guitars. You get so many different shockingly melodic turns and sort of chordal structures that come out of these songs, especially by the time they've gotten to their third album, that it just feels like, oh, well, it was a gold mine that was just sitting around in the corner and you missed it for the last 30 years, Jeff. So I feel kind of dumb. And I also feel like, nevertheless, I'm going to have to be a passenger on the show because again, these are going to be very early formed opinions. I'm no veteran. I've been familiar with Slater Kenny, the full discography, though I've been familiar with it only for about a month now, but, boy, am I looking forward to discussing it.
- [24:40]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
You take everything, you take what I want. You take everything, you take what I want from you.
- [24:56]
Scott Bertram
We didn't have lengthy discussions before we began taping, so I. I don't necessarily know where everyone gonna land on some of this stuff, which I guess means we might as well just begin.
- [25:08]
Jeff Blair
You want to set up the background or I can try.
- [25:10]
Scott Bertram
Yeah. I don't. It's. You know, Nick is going to play a very key role in the episode, as our guests always do. But Nick actually took the time to read the memoir of Carrie Brownstein, so.
- [25:20]
Jeff Blair
Oh, that's good.
- [25:22]
Nick Rowan
Do you want me to do my best impression of Wikipedia here?
- [25:26]
Scott Bertram
Sure, sure. Lead us in. Give it a shot. Lead us in. Go ahead.
- [25:29]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Ahead.
- [25:30]
Nick Rowan
Okay. Well, you know, like a lot of these bands, I think it's important to talk about where the members came from. So Carrie Brownstein grew up in the suburbs of Seattle. Corinne Tucker is from Eugene origin, Oregon. But I think, you know, grew up around Portland. And then Janet Weiss, of course, is from Portland and had been there forever. The way that they started out was in the Riot Girl movement. You two were alive for the Riot Girl movement. I was not. Maybe you can speak to, like, why this was popular, why. Why people liked this music.
- [26:13]
Jeff Blair
I'm glad you prompted me like that. Then. I do have, like, some brief things I can say. I will. I'll start with the confession that I was never a listener to any of this stuff. And I always felt like the name sort of unnecessarily commodified what was. What was far better described as just either punk rock or alt rock. The only difference is that I guess it was given a slightly political valence because of the fact that it was also feminist. It was female centered. And of course, that's maybe, maybe another thing I found intimidating as a kid about Slater Kitty. It's an all girl band. They would think I was such a dork, you know, so it was that sort of a thing. And of course that has obvious overtones of sort of feminist empowerment and whatnot. That, believe it or not, actually are absent from so much of Slater Kinney's work. That's the other thing. This is very feminine music. It's about female problems and female perspectives. But it's not like it's not stridently femme. It just feels like it's real life situations that are easily understandable and also generalizable to anybody. It's a remarkable lyrical approach.
- [27:14]
Scott Bertram
I think that would actually. I mean, that would be a little more apparent the farther you go. The early stuff is a little more female centric.
- [27:24]
Nick Rowan
Well, so the way, the way that the band got together was Grin Tucker was in a band called Heavens to Betsy and Carrie Brownstein was in a band called Excuse 17. And they were all playing around the Olympia area with all these other girl bands. And they felt stifled. You know, they felt. They felt that they had to be overtly feminist all the time. And they, they, they, they harp on this in interviews. And they have for decades now how they wanted to be taken seriously as a band, not as a girl band. They just want it to be a band that makes music that's good, that people like without even knowing it.
- [28:06]
Jeff Blair
That makes so much sense. Yeah, you can just hear it in their music.
- [28:10]
Nick Rowan
They're just ultimately there for the art. And so they decamped to Melbourne, Australia, to clear their heads. And that's actually where they recorded the first album.
- [28:23]
Jeff Blair
It was the last day of their vacation or something.
- [28:25]
Nick Rowan
Yeah. In a single night.
- [28:34]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Way up in the sky that is where am I? I'm 3D. I like it way out there In a bunch of dreams I'm down on my knees I know what you are I know what you are I don't think you want to know I don't think you want to know I don't think you want to miss a round of things Don't.
- [29:10]
Jeff Blair
And that actually brings us to Slater Kinney, which is a. I guess it's an album or is it an ep that they actually don't consider it their first album. They think of the next one, Call the Doctor, as their first album and this just sort of as an experiment they were doing while they were still in other bands. But. But I gotta tell you, I mean, this first album is 22 minutes, first of all. Can't complain about that. You know, I love short records. And you also know how much I love, you know, albums like Telephono by Spoon or Slanted and Enchanted by Pavement. There is nothing wrong with this record except that it's early careers. Even great bands have to go through that proto phase, as I said, where they idolize Pavement. And, yeah, I think they sell the premise of what they're doing right away with the first song, don't think you wanna. It's just, you know, it's a straight sale of angular postpunk. It's a lo fi musical approach. I'm assuming they're recording live in the studio because they're doing it in one day. And yet you got that shockingly melodic lyrical voice Corinne Tucker sings, and she's got that X scene kind of a whale. She can declaim with the best of them, but she sings too, and she sings songs because these are songs, songs that deserve to be sung. I mean, these are. These are really decent, melodic songs. And yet they're still very green. I don't. I mean, I think they were like 18, 19. One of them was three years ahead of the other one in college.
- [31:19]
Scott Bertram
Brownstein was younger. Yeah, she had.
- [31:20]
Nick Rowan
Brownstein was 20 at the time. Yeah.
- [31:22]
Jeff Blair
So, so young. So young at the time and still pretty darn assured. What do you guys think of it?
- [31:27]
Nick Rowan
You know that song, A Real Man?
- [31:31]
Jeff Blair
Yeah, A lot of sexual politics on that one.
- [31:33]
Scott Bertram
But what.
- [31:33]
Jeff Blair
Of course.
- [31:33]
Nick Rowan
Yeah, yeah. It's like a minute long. And yeah, as you said, they're, they're. They move away from those kinds of lyrics later on, but, man, the energy is great. I like that in spite of myself.
- [32:12]
Jeff Blair
See, this is a kind of like, early. Again, if you've heard Slanted and Enchanted, there's a lot of aggressive, noisy energy. In fact, guys who are screaming like, I'm drawing, I'm drawing in your ear, a lot of people will not be able to get into that vibe. And this is where they're at right now. And it's probably no, no, no coincidence that Stephen Malus Payment finally ended up moving to Portland himself, like doing his band out of is the vibe. And this is the old scene. But I do like these early songs. I mean, the, the. These. These last few songs, they're about as generic as Slater Kenny gets. But I really like, you know, you know, slow song. I like that Laura song, which is the one I think is by the drummer, or I guess about drummer sung
- [32:52]
Scott Bertram
by the drummer, I think, which we
- [32:54]
Jeff Blair
should, by the way, point out. They are not the Slater Kenny that we know of as, you know, the Power Trio with Janet Weiss. Yet they still have a different drummer who I, you know, don't really know the biographical background about. And somebody else might. Well, the difference. She's kind of like the Gary Young of Slater K. Slater Kitty, that was the original drummer for Pavement, who was kind of sloppy.
- [33:13]
Nick Rowan
She. So the way that they found her is actually tied up in them going to Australia. They were pen pals with her, you know, like they would write her physical letters. And I guess she was part of the Melbourne Sweet, actually. Yeah, right. She was part of the Melbourne, the riot girl scene. And so they went down there to jam with her and, you know, I guess they didn't really have a band because they didn't record until they were about to go home.
- [33:44]
Jeff Blair
Right. But she. She actually stayed for their second album. So they probably, you know, they probably. Yeah, you can do this well enough. That's good.
- [33:53]
Nick Rowan
And then they. They got rid of her and went through two other drummers before they finally got her around to Weiss. But.
- [34:01]
Jeff Blair
Scott, do you have any thoughts on this first album before we move on this ep? If you want to call it that.
- [34:06]
Scott Bertram
You said the word generic and the word that I came back to a number of times here is at least nondescript. You know, nothing to me really breaks out. Nothing to me stands out as truly, truly special. Remember, it's a side project at this point for. For. For Brownstein and Tucker. They had. They had day jobs or at least day bands. And so trying to figure out exactly what they want this to be or what it can be. And so there are a couple. I think the Day I Went Away is one of those songs that foreshadows some of the good stuff to come. One of the early times they. They blend the vocals a little bit. There's a wonderful dive into the pre chorus with some heavy strumming on the guitar. That's a song that I think maybe is one that gives them hope that this is going to be more than just a one off the Day I Went Away.
- [35:02]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
So far so good. So far I was. So far so Good so far I won. So far, so good so far.
- [35:48]
Scott Bertram
The last song is where we hear some of the shrieking vocals in the chorus. It feels.
- [35:55]
Jeff Blair
It feels. Some people must hate that, but I love that vocal approach. Yeah. I don't know. I can just see why people. There are people like, why is this woman constantly yelling at me? She does have. Have that tone, but it hits her notes so well. She has vibrato. She's not just sort of, like, punkish. She's, like, singing with real technique. And I don't know, man. It's just. It rings. My bel works very well to me.
- [36:17]
Scott Bertram
And the last song is a story. You said this would be the last time you'd ever hurt me. You said this would be the last time I'd ever cry. So there's a buildup in the verses where you have the release in the chorus, like, this bad relationship. I need you out of me before I turn into you. And so when there is this release in the chorus, the sort of. The shrieking, it feels earned. At least it does to me. And I think. Think one other thing that needs to be pointed out here is that at this point, Tucker and Brownstein are girlfriend girlfriends. Like, girlfriend. They're together. And that would change by the next album, but at this point, they're together. And as I said, and Nick mentioned too, there are more songs here, maybe, perhaps on the rest of the records combined, I don't know, that are sort of explicitly from a female perspective. And I find it difficult to sort of relate in a few places. But they would resolve any of those problems, I think, very quickly. And as Jeff pointed out earlier, write songs that really, anyone can relate to.
- [37:29]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
You said this would be the last time I'd ever cry. Last time I didn't know. How was I supposed to know? This time I found it and know how to scream. I don't want you anything. You can take away everything I. Not one of you. This song, your song is the only song I'll ever do.
- [38:22]
Nick Rowan
It's. It's more strident, you know, even later on in. In one beat, where, you know, some of those songs are very political, but they're not. I don't know. It's almost like hectoring on this album. You feel like you're being yelled at.
- [38:40]
Jeff Blair
You know, that's the thing. There's. There's a tenderness later on. In fact, there are some songs on later albums that I'm really kind of like, downright shocked by, impressed by, Like. Like, wow. You can really reach a perfect note And a perfect sentiment there. You don't get that here. But I don't really know if I've. I didn't. I didn't have nearly as much of like an issue as I expected, sort of relating to these, you know, these sorts of themes. I just feel it's like reading fiction. And in fact, that's actually a great way to think of it. I think of these guys. These guys, as I just accidentally called it, these girls are kind of like the Virginia Wolf of rock bands in the sense that they're actually really creative but very self contained and fiercely independent, you know. And, you know, maybe the ingredients haven't really come together into the right stew just yet, but I really think they get almost there with their second album. By the way, I to don't want to. Do you have any final thoughts that you want to add, Nick, before we move on to that?
- [39:32]
Nick Rowan
You know, no, but it is, it is funny that you mentioned Virginia Woolf because in. In her memoir, Brownstein talks about how she had this idea when she was moving to Olympia to start this band that it was going to be like the Bloomsbury Group.
- [39:49]
Jeff Blair
Damn.
- [39:49]
Nick Rowan
It isn't that.
- [39:50]
Jeff Blair
I knew it.
- [39:50]
Nick Rowan
Right, Right.
- [39:51]
Jeff Blair
Yeah.
- [39:52]
Nick Rowan
I don't know. The idea of, of a pacific northwestern Bloomsbury group is, is. It's delightful to me. But no, let's move on, okay.
- [40:01]
Jeff Blair
Because here is what they all consider actually their first true album. It's called the Doctor and boy, I was prepared to say, well, this is just an underrated masterpiece, but the fact is, is it doesn't hold all the way together on the second half of the album in particular.
- [40:15]
Scott Bertram
There.
- [40:15]
Jeff Blair
There are too many weak songs on that second half for me to really judge it a complete triumph. But man, the first part of this record just sort of blows me away. The title track opens with the title track called the Doctor and it starts as one song mate. You think it' to be more of a scratchy kind of, you know, angular punk thing. And then by the time it ends, it's turned into something else completely. I also think like there. There's songs that have like really catchy pop choruses like Hub Cap. You take it, you take everything. You take what I want. That's a really good chorus. But the first major song on their. On. On their career, I would say comes on this record and it's Anonymous, which is just something on the level of spoons. Everything hits at once in terms of like it's a here we are in full strength moment. You know, they don't have Janet Weiss yet. But they have this great lyric, this conflicted lament. I mean, she's writing. I assume it's Corinne writing these lyrics. She's writing about a girl, a character sketch of a girl who's like hiding her intellect and her talent under a layer of self abnegating, reflexive, you know, self deprecation. She just wants to be anonymous, you know, I don't want to give enough of you not enough for you to own, not enough for you to know that she's hiding from these things. And it's a sympathetic portrait, but of a very weird and very recognizably particular personality. You almost wonder if she's criticizing herself or maybe somebody in the band, I don't know. But that chorus just slams. It absolutely slams. And it's the first time they write something that the media says. Instant hooks
- [42:24]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
sign as well. Drop lines, my friend I got my white girl line Just want the spider to catch to catch that line. But I don't know why. Want. She want to be me like everybody else.
- [43:16]
Scott Bertram
I agree that it's the first time they write songs that really have heft to them, that really stick around. I differ on the song. I'll come back to that in a second. I want to make one point because Jeff said, you're saying, I think Korn wrote this. Tucker wrote this. I have to say, I've been a Slater Kinney fan for a while. I mean, not a Die Hard, right. But I still have trouble figuring out exactly who's singing at times. And I certainly don't know which one is playing which guitar part on these songs.
- [43:45]
Jeff Blair
So I have a lot of educated guests at work, but I don't know.
- [43:48]
Scott Bertram
Right. But I. And they don't necessarily distinguish, you know,
- [43:52]
Jeff Blair
it's not like one of my flashy lead soloists, you know, and the other ones that.
- [43:56]
Nick Rowan
Just playing conversational.
- [43:58]
Jeff Blair
Yeah, yeah. It's not like Jones and Richard and the Stones or something.
- [44:02]
Scott Bertram
So we might not be quite as specific as you're accustomed to in some of these description about who's doing what, because I don't. I don't know. I'd have to watch them play live. And There are some YouTube clips up there. So. Yeah. Called the Doctor. It's their. It's their first proper album. Right. It's the first time you get that real interplay between the voices on a number of songs. I think they. First time they write a number of songs with really powerful choruses. There's more complex guitar work happening here than on the first record. And heck, it's where they realize certainly it won't just be a side project, you know, Slater, Kenny, this is what we're going to do together. Now, if we could just find a drummer that we love. Well, hold on to that thought. Anonymous is a great song. I think the song that really stands out to me here is one where things come together is a few songs later on Good Thing. And you mentioned, you know, that the emotional heft to some of the lyrics and how. Let's use the word tender, how tender they can be at times that's apparent. And Good Thing here. And it's Corin singing this. There's this wistfulness inside a punk song. It's a really, really good song, you know. Why do good things never want to stay at the end telling herself this time it'll be all right this time it'll be okay Good Thing is one of the times first times things really all come together why do good things
- [45:33]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
never wanna stay day Something to lose Something to give away this time it'll be all right Next time it'll be okay Next time it'll be all right this time it'll be okay the hardest part is everything's all out of sight.
- [46:05]
Scott Bertram
I had mentioned earlier, I am pretty sure I had heard I want to be your Joey Ramone a few times. It's a very familiar song for me. And this is one where, man, when those voices hit in the chorus and the yeah yeah and the squeals, I liken it to a bottle rocket going off. You like the bottle rocket and you know it goes before it pops. That's what it sounds like in the chorus to I Want to be your Joey Ramone. And it hits out a theme that come back to time and again too, which is love of music, sometimes like. Or hatred of the music industry. How to deal with fans, what it's like being a fan of music. And so I really relate to all that in I Want to Be youe Joy Ramon, when singing about pictures of me on your bedroom door and I'm the queen of rock and roll. That's a truly undeniable chorus and of the catchiest songs on this record.
- [47:23]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Know I'm the queen of rock and roll Just don't care Are you that scared? I swear they're looking right at me to the front so I can see it's what I thought. It's rock and roll.
- [47:48]
Nick Rowan
Yeah, that one's a real ear one worm. I. You've already mentioned two great songs. I like Little Mouth a lot.
- [47:54]
Scott Bertram
Yeah, that's a good one.
- [47:56]
Nick Rowan
It just, you know, it's. It's short and sweet. I'm wondering, though. So they give Thurston Moore a shout out on I Want To. Yeah. So there's the Direct Sonic Direct tribute.
- [48:39]
Jeff Blair
Yeah. And you can hear all these songs, too.
- [48:41]
Nick Rowan
But why not Kim Gordon?
- [48:44]
Jeff Blair
Well, I'm going to talk about how Kim Gordon. In fact, some of that influence becomes even more obvious on later records. But I don't know, maybe they had some feud. Didn't they end up touring with them, though? I mean, I can't imagine there's anything like that. And maybe. Maybe it's a guitar thing, because I don't think Kim Gordon. Yeah, this is. This is a band without a basis, right.
- [49:04]
Nick Rowan
Yeah, that's true.
- [49:05]
Scott Bertram
Yep. Yep. But, you know, to Jeff's point, as we say a lot of nice things about Call the Doctor, I guess we have to say something. Some not nice things, which is. The back half, as Jeff said, is nowhere near as strong as those first, what, six songs or so we've been talking about. There's this kind of waltzy type thing called Taking Me Home, which I don't think is up to standards. There's one called My Stuff that I'm not a big fan of on the back half. There is one called I'm Not Waiting that I think is pretty good, but the momentum falls off. There are a handful of real highlights here, but it's not a complete record.
- [49:43]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Not Where Till I Grow Up. Tell me, Tell me how.
- [50:26]
Jeff Blair
Now, Scott, the thing is, we agree on the overarching thesis, but, like, I would literally reverse your picks. My Stuff I think, is pretty funny. It's pretty interesting. Nice little heavy metal riff. Have a lot of Secretly Led Zeppelin hidden in their sound.
- [50:38]
Scott Bertram
Although it doesn't talk about. There's a song later on that.
- [50:41]
Jeff Blair
Yeah, all right. And it's really going to come out in later records, but, like, yeah, my Stuff, I'm Not Waiting. However, I really don't like that song. It's like one of the very few skip tracks I think I've encountered with the band so far. That last song is the one thing that redeems the second half, in my opinion. Heart Attack is a really nice little. Again, a lighter and frankly, a pretty poppy little song. Beyond that, this is where they're still hitting their limitations. I think they were about to bust through all of them pretty soon. But before we get there, any final thoughts? Thoughts, Nick?
- [51:10]
Nick Rowan
No, no, let's move on to. To Dig Me Out. I think this is my favorite record of theirs.
- [51:15]
Jeff Blair
Oh, yes. And that obviously you are a man of exquisite and cultured taste. Because I agree with you as a guy who's known them for about, you know, one month. I still think this is maybe actually high praise, but this actually vaults its way up into my, you know, top five top ten records of the decade. Now, keep in mind, what kind of heavy hitters occupy that? You know, we're talking about the best of Radiohead and Pavement, a lot of other great bands. But then this album is a miracle. What is the single most important thing that happens between Call the Doctor and Dig Me Out? They find Janet Weiss, and boy, it is actually a really clear difference. She's not a flash drummer, she's not Neil Peart. Right. But she's always interesting and relentlessly energetic. She's driving all of these songs forward. And this is a trio, too, which is something that makes this sound even more.
- [52:05]
Nick Rowan
More great.
- [52:06]
Jeff Blair
You know, Scott said, maybe some people don't like the fact that there isn't a base on this record. Are you kidding me? I love the fact that it's just two guitars interweaving right in and out of one another. No bass holding the low end. One of the guitars basically plays the low end for you.
- [52:56]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Take me.
- [53:15]
Jeff Blair
And then you've got the drum work holding it all together. This thing is just like a series. There's like 12 little perfect gems on it. I have no idea how I managed to not hear it for so long life. But I could start, you know, from track one, from the title track, Dig Me out, just a nasty punk anthem. But then it's again develops this surprisingly nagging melodic riff that drives the whole thing. And then it gets into one of the finest songs I think this band will ever write. And I don't know if I. Everyone else probably has something to say about One More Hour, but this is the song I was referring to when I said, boy, these lyrics can be surprisingly moving.
- [53:48]
Nick Rowan
I mean, it's a beautiful song.
- [53:50]
Jeff Blair
Yeah, it's a beautiful song about, you know, you know, the end of a romance. In One more hour I'll be gone I'll leave the dress you wore the pretty shoes these things I left behind for you. And this is married to one of the most beautiful melodies and frankly, pop hooks that they'll ever write. And it just comes right there near the beginning of the album. And, you know, it's written by Corinne Tucker about Carrie Brownstein, but if you don't know that, you'll still be just sort of sitting there, slack jaw Just amazed at sort of. It immediately seizes an emotional moment and it holds you in it. And that's right at the beginning of the album. And we can talk about nearly every track on Dig Me Out. I love this record. It's a newfound joy of mine.
- [54:56]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Oh, you got the darkest eyes Are you got the darkest dance. You.
- [55:36]
Scott Bertram
I agree, this is tremendous, tremendous record. I'm not certain it's their best. We'll come back to that, but it's awfully close.
- [55:47]
Jeff Blair
It's the Spoon Pavement problem with too much consistency. Right. This is a good band.
- [55:52]
Scott Bertram
The more I listened to it, the more I loved it. The more I listened to it, the more I wanted to come back to it, the more those hooks and those chorus lines would stick in my head. This is. You know, Weiss makes a huge difference, I think, to the sound. And, you know, and she helps to hold, you know, no bass, but she helps to hold down that bottom end with. With her drums. My song is Turn it on, which is just after one more hour. Turn it on to me again. That. That's the standout track here. There are so many from. But, man, there is a great delayed reveal of that Turn it on part until the very end. And then it's just like jet fuel. It just powers all the way. They're unleashed at the end of the song. You know what she thinks when you touch me I could not stand up and makes you, like, believe that feeling you get the hand claps in the chorus. I'm a sucker for that. I mean, Turn it on is. Is just an amazing track.
- [57:15]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Hell down. Why can't you tell me? Is it worth the fight? Do I sound crazy? Oh, I just might. Why dare you?
- [57:43]
Scott Bertram
That's my favorite here. But you could pick from a number of things.
- [57:46]
Jeff Blair
I think I got five other ones. I could say that.
- [57:48]
Nick Rowan
Yeah. I. So when. When I put this one on, if I hear Dig Me Out, I have to listen to the next four tracks. I cannot skip, like, you know, even if I. If it just, like, came on, like, in the car and I wasn't listening to anything else by Slater Kenny, I have to listen to the next four. Up through the drama, you've been putting Gravy. The other songs are great too, but those four songs I have to listen together, they. They're just sequenced so well. One song just falls right into the next one.
- [58:19]
Scott Bertram
Well, you might as well extend that to five, right? Fifth. Fifth song, I think is Heart Factory. That.
- [58:23]
Nick Rowan
That's. Oh, shoot. Yeah, that one's great, too.
- [58:26]
Scott Bertram
I mean, when you get that, that machine like assembly noises at the start. And this is where again, you know, themes. I'll come back to themes. This is what, you know, subverting the expectations of women. Find me out. I'm not just made of parts you can break right through this box you put me into. Like, again, not just a girl group. They're not just riot girl. There's a lot of. Of level and depth to what they're doing here, man. Heart Factory is also a great song. So, yeah, you have to go at least five deep, Nick, I'm telling.
- [59:01]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
You. And you can give him what you want. You can get up and go. You can take your heart out and you can put it back in. I think we found a way to put the fun back inside.
- [59:44]
Jeff Blair
Well, Scott, actually you have to go at least six deep is what I'm telling you.
- [59:47]
Scott Bertram
But if.
- [59:48]
Nick Rowan
If you're going to do that, you got to go to. It's enough as well. I mean. That's right.
- [59:51]
Jeff Blair
But here's the thing though. You didn't mention words and guitar, which is what follows heart factor. And again, just like this might as well be simple beat pop. This is so. It's not like a rock simple song because it's a very clever pop chorus. But I love the energy. And what is it about words and guitar? I've got it. Words and guitar. I want it. I want it way, way too loud. This is not about anything other than just how fun it is to get out there and fill the space surrounding me with words and guitar. And then it breaks into this amazing little Beatlesque. Or actually I'm thinking it's more Beach Bo. Always ask chorus where it's like I dream of quiet songs. I hear the silky sounds. Hush, hush and rock. What a contrast. What an effortless contrast between hard and soft, but always lyrical, always musical.
- [60:51]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Oh, give me pretty song.
- [61:19]
Jeff Blair
And again, that's like the. That's the halfway point of the record. It doesn't really let up from there, in my opinion. I could take it all the way to a dance song 97, which by the way, sounds like halfway to Elvis Costello when it gets to that chorus with the organ playing in it. It's very, very attraction style. But again, they're so fresh. There's nothing labored about the record. There's nothing. It's funny. They're very, very, very careful. They wanted to be taken seriously, right? But what they somehow managed to miraculously avoid is falling into that pitfall of being too serious.
- [61:51]
Nick Rowan
There's.
- [61:51]
Jeff Blair
There's nothing here that makes me feel ponderous.
- [61:53]
Scott Bertram
There's a song here with the giant hook that goes, dum dum da dum Dum da da dum dum Little babies. That's so much fun. I actually wrote down. I wrote down so much fun. And I like fun. It's infectious. They have humor to go along with the swagger. It's a wonderful combination.
- [62:14]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Go. I want to. Set the.
- [63:02]
Jeff Blair
Such a surprise. What a wonderful thing for me to have found. I could just talk about all the other. Buy Her Candy is a wonderful sonic experiment. It's. Again, there's two intertwined guitars and that's all it is. And. But. But the thing is, it sometimes actually makes me feel like it makes me sound like Bob. Sounds to me a lot like My Bloody Valentine, which might sound strange because it doesn't have sheets of sound or any of that Kevin Shields stuff you're expecting, but it does sound like the. The chords and the melody of some of those songs off of Isn't anything and whatnot. Very Belinda Butcher. I love that vibe. I love all these vibes. And this is a band that literally, actively, aggressively, and with an immense amount of creativity fuses together the sounds of five other groups. I also. And that they come up with something new.
- [64:13]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
She's famous
- [64:16]
Jeff Blair
she's the best
- [64:20]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Can I let my heart she is selfish
- [64:30]
Nick Rowan
she
- [64:30]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
is kind no one can stand say
- [64:36]
Jeff Blair
she is mine this album, boy, I. I should have just gotten it when I first saw it in the racks. And I'll still emphasize again, that cover is the best cover of their career. That album cover just gives me good, warm feelings. It consciously pays tribute to another classic rock band, which would really be embarrassing if the album wasn't absolutely a 10 out of 10 itself.
- [64:59]
Nick Rowan
Yeah, it's a total classic. So when. When they were auditioning drummers for this, the first track that they had Janet Weiss play was Dig Me Out. So they. They really just started from the top with her and went straight down the line, which I think is really cool.
- [65:19]
Jeff Blair
Scott, any final thoughts or do we want to move on to what I consider to be pretty much an equal peak?
- [65:25]
Scott Bertram
Yeah, I. I'll make one more note because I actually have it written down twice here. And maybe it's a lazy comparison to make for reasons which will become obvious in a moment, but especially when you look at Dance Song. You said Costello. Yeah, but that. And I think like the drama you've been craving, which is earlier and because of the two female voices, like there's some B52s love happening. Here, Right. Cindy Wilson and Kate Peterson. You have those two voices that again are also united. Unique but similar. Which is. I would somewhat describe, you know, Tucker and Brownstein the same way. Certainly you can pick those voices out, but they also blend very well. And when you sort of have some of the. Occasionally there's like surf rock riffs, those little organ lines and places like on Dance Song. There's certainly some B52's influence that seeps in here too.
- [66:21]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Are you're the one that I want. You can try to keep it down Try not to let the words come out But I tell you it's no use if you're going way too hard if you're feeling way too much but inside you can stop desire.
- [67:05]
Jeff Blair
Do we want to talk about the hot rock? Which.
- [67:09]
Nick Rowan
Yes. The true best album cover. The hot rock.
- [67:12]
Jeff Blair
Yeah, they really do. They do look really stylish there. Posing and hailing of a couple cab.
- [67:17]
Nick Rowan
It's just. It's a very good snapshot of. Of the band's energy. That's. That's how I feel about it.
- [67:23]
Jeff Blair
Yes. It's just fairly effortless, effortlessly cool. And that's actually the way I described this album. I know I did a little bit of research and people were saying on this record, like, oh, it's a big evolution. It's a big change of sound. Slater, Kenny and I don't hear that at all, honestly. What I hear is a refinement of sound. I mean, they're getting more post punk now, but the post punk sounds were always there in their. And you know, I guess main. The main difference is that there is an emphasis on pretty careful arrangements of songs instead of bashing them out.
- [68:14]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Close together. What we. Are, I wonder.
- [68:45]
Jeff Blair
That start Together, which is the way albums is like a perfect example of that. There's that break. I don't know what it is. Is it a break or is it a pre chorus? It's just built out of weaving guitars. But really the one on this record that just absolutely destroys me is Burn Don't Freeze.
- [69:00]
Nick Rowan
Oh, yes.
- [69:01]
Jeff Blair
Interweaving vocals, the back and forth. I don't know, is it let. It's less verse chorus versus song structure. That is verse, verse, verse, verse, verse, verse, verse. And the drumming on it is so perfect. It is so powerful. It is basically Janet Weiss's like calling card with the group. This is them, I guess, moving just from strength to strength. They finally found the formula that really worked for them and now they're going to develop it in really beautiful ways.
- [70:09]
Nick Rowan
I love Burn don't freeze because, you know, it's a total ear worm. I have no idea what they're saying. I. I cannot decipher the lyrics, and I don't really care. But the. The one that I really love is the end of you. Especially when they just start screaming the end of you at the end of it. That I don't know. And I like songs about boats.
- [71:14]
Scott Bertram
I. I will be somewhat critical. Jeff, you said it's not. You know, it's a little refinement.
- [71:21]
Jeff Blair
Yeah.
- [71:21]
Scott Bertram
It's a little more subdued. It's a little more introspective in parts. I don't like it quite as much as I like Dig Me Out. And yet there are really good. Okay, here's this post punk. Jeff, you're post punk. Band from the End of the World. Reminds me of the rhythms of an echo in the Bunnyman track, which I
- [71:45]
Jeff Blair
never have that note, actually.
- [71:46]
Scott Bertram
Yeah. Which I never would have said.
- [71:47]
Jeff Blair
Echoing the bullshit. 20 minutes.
- [71:48]
Scott Bertram
Yeah. Band from That's. That's one of my favorite songs here on the record. But, yeah, it has that guitar break
- [71:54]
Jeff Blair
on that sounds very like Will Sergeant with something from Echo.
- [71:57]
Nick Rowan
Yeah.
- [71:57]
Scott Bertram
That same sort of energy. I want to party like it's 1999, but wistful about it, not excited about it. They're just sort of stating it, matter of fact. So you have that energy here.
- [72:17]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
End of the world, end of the world, end of the world. Back. These eyes are shut if you want it, come on over and throw me out when the party is over.
- [72:53]
Scott Bertram
The other thing that I picked up on, like a. So, like, Get Up, get up is great. Get up has this sort of Talking Heads kind of vibe. The speaker?
- [73:03]
Jeff Blair
No, no, the Talking Heads. This is the most Sonic Youth song that ever.
- [73:07]
Scott Bertram
Well, I don't know Sonic Youth as well as you do, so I'm just saying.
- [73:11]
Jeff Blair
Every time I listen to Corinne sing that song, she declaims it. She just sings. This is the one where she is Kim Gordon. I hear the Sprawl and Daydream Nation all over this. If you've ever heard the Sprawl, you just write in the beginning where Kim sings to the extent that I wear short skirts and stuff. She is basically delivering the same kind of message in the same voice and in fact, the same tone. It's also another great song, and it has that same sort of angular riff, which, again, feels like more like Thurston Moore than any anything else. So, yeah, this is their Sonic Youth number. Pretty fun video, too.
- [74:31]
Scott Bertram
The Size of Our Love. That's a really almost unusually direct storytelling from Carrie in this one. Sitting in a hospital room, walking hospital hallways. Our love is the size of these tumors inside us. It's presented at the beginning in a way that makes you think that maybe they both have tumors. I don't think that's actually what it means. I think it's that love is so strong that when. If you have a tumor, we both have a tumor, you have a problem. We both have a problem. Because by the time you get to the end of the song, it sounds to me like the significant other has passed away and she remains. And I think there's a line where I forgot all the things I could do by myself. And at the very end, the size of this hole in the ground where my heart's buried now the size of our love is the size of the hole in the ground where my heart's buried now My love is gone and it's figuring out what to do next, how to move on. It's a really direct sort of story that she tells there and set to, again, this very moving melody and that they pull off really well. That's a really nice song by Carrie.
- [75:51]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Fight for a heart Fight for a strong heart Fight to never Sickness, you know and now it's my own I gave it a home.
- [76:31]
Jeff Blair
Well, I like the hot rock. A lock. I. I think Don't Talk like is. Is like a really lovely set of melancholy chord changes that again, put me in the mind of something like Malchus and really a worthy song. That would have been like a really great Pavement album track. In fact. That, again, characterizes songs. It's just top shelf songcraft. There's nothing lazy about anything they're doing. There's no, like, simple verse, no get me across chorus. Everything is actually very experimental, and it's a miracle that it all comes off as well as it does. Now. Do you have any other thoughts to add, Nick, or do we want to go on to the troubled album in Slater Kenny's career?
- [77:08]
Nick Rowan
Let's, let's. Let's move to the trouble.
- [77:11]
Jeff Blair
The troubled album, and I'll have to say this. In my brief survey of this band, my brief experience knowing them, my. If I had to choo one of these records from this sort of classic period as opposed to the post Weiss period, the one that really doesn't make it that much for me is 2000's all hands on the Bad one. Do like the COVID though.
- [77:31]
Nick Rowan
I'm right there with you on that one.
- [77:32]
Jeff Blair
All right, well, talk to me about it. What's Your problem with the way it is with me, it's.
- [77:39]
Nick Rowan
It's too playful.
- [77:41]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Meet me at the. Keep turning me on with those French words I can't pronounce. Yeah,
- [78:18]
Nick Rowan
It's. I don't know it. It's also Carrie Brownstein's least favorite, for what it's worth, but I don't know that I like the title track. All Hands on the Bad One, I think is a fun song, and you're no rock and roll. Fun is also. Is also great Cancer. Deny it. But some of this other stuff, it. I don't want to say it bores me because that's none. None of the music. Even the bad stuff really bores me, but I don't know.
- [78:54]
Jeff Blair
It's a song like Milkshake and Honey, which is pretty pleasurable. I like it. It plays off nice, but it's also very light and very breezy. Vis. A MasterCard discovered I was spent Took my heart My best jeans left me paying the rent. It's a fun little thing.
- [79:11]
Nick Rowan
Yeah.
- [79:11]
Jeff Blair
Maybe it's too light. It will just sort of blow away if you're not careful, and I think there's a little bit of that here. Now, I know this is also Scott's nominee for, like, what, Modern masterpiece of the 20th century.
- [79:22]
Nick Rowan
Yeah. So, I mean, we're dumping all over this, but maybe you should rise to defend it.
- [79:26]
Scott Bertram
I'll defend it. It's not my. My choice for modern masterpiece, but I think it's a lot better than you both give it credit for this. I don't mind the jovialness. This is a song that you put. Sure. This is a song you might put on at a party instead of maybe the hot rock. This is fun. It's a little more uptempo. There's a looseness to it. There's a. There's a joy to a number of the songs. There's a lot of good stuff here, guys. I love Ballad of A. I'm not
- [79:54]
Jeff Blair
giving it a C minus here, Scott. I'm just saying it's more like a
- [79:57]
Scott Bertram
B ballad of a lady, man. It's a great song. I. I love the. The big, chunky riffs, the.
- [80:02]
Jeff Blair
The.
- [80:02]
Scott Bertram
The hand claps. I. I love the story here where she sort of. Sort of is bemoaning the fact that she's not elegant and she's not, you know, conventionally beautiful, and she's like more like a. Well, like a. Like a lady man. They say I've gone too far with the image I've got, and they know I'D make a mint with a new plastic skin and a hit on the radio. And she hits that note at the very end. I could be demure and then a few lines later, but I got a rock. It's a fun opener. I think it's a good opener to the album
- [80:37]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
of God. But. New plastic skin and a hit on the radio. Temptations of a Lady. Are you holding on too upright A bit too long Are we breaking on your side? Are we breaking you up? How many times will you deciding.
- [81:28]
Scott Bertram
You know, Nick already mentioned two great ones. You're no rock and roll fun, which I talked about earlier. The title track's great. How do you not like the title track? What a fantastic groove. Weiss has a great.
- [81:38]
Nick Rowan
Oh, I do like the title track.
- [81:39]
Jeff Blair
Yeah, so do I.
- [81:40]
Scott Bertram
Well, I'm just saying in general,
- [81:44]
Jeff Blair
you know. My wife gets me on for that all the time, you know. Don't use you unless you really mean you.
- [81:48]
Scott Bertram
It's a.
- [81:49]
Jeff Blair
It's a royal
- [81:53]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
take. The hell be the first in life to sh. The. All hands on the back one. All hands on the back one.
- [82:44]
Scott Bertram
That's a great song. I love that. Youth Decay is a huge, huge chorus. Am I rotting out? Daddy says I got my mama's.
- [82:50]
Jeff Blair
That's a great.
- [82:52]
Scott Bertram
That's a great song. Was It a Lie? Is great music. It's a weird story about like televising replaying the death of a woman on the highway. She died right away her body flung almost 60ft as she split in two Was she coming straight at you? And it gets back to a woman's pain. Never private, always seen. It's kind of an allegory, I think to a lot of that.
- [83:30]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
The train was moving through as we know that we'll have to do. Everyone will say it was placed inside this awful place. The accident is about to start. Was it alive? Was it alive? Did it feel your.
- [84:10]
Scott Bertram
I like milkshake and honey Pompeii that wicked riff, that twirling, swirling riff in Pompeii you Royal, you. You've gotta like that. That could be an instrumental. That song doesn't even need words. Pompeii is really fun. I I. You know, this is not my choice for were their best record. It might not even be. I don't know where it places. It's probably in the top four for me somewhere. I just think it's very good. I don't think it deserves to be dumped on, even by members of the band. As Nick told us. It's a good, good record.
- [85:22]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Find out you're gonna get.
- [85:29]
Jeff Blair
I'll also point out that this band, unlike so many other groups that we discuss on, on the show, this band was unusually productive during this era. They were a hard working group. They put out one release per year at this point, which is, you know, even Radiohead at that time was going like three years, four years between everything. Slater Kitty had a ton of ideas, they had a ton of energy and they were really eager to get it out. So yeah, I think this one's a bit of a dip. But given it's like their sixth album and they really aren't going to flag, I don't really hold too much of it against them. Do you have anything more to add about this one, Nick, or do we want.
- [86:04]
Nick Rowan
Yeah, yeah, I, I should. I should add that they did all of this up to this point without an agent.
- [86:11]
Jeff Blair
They true indie. Yeah, yeah.
- [86:12]
Nick Rowan
They represented themselves. Apparently they did their own taxes for the band as well.
- [86:19]
Jeff Blair
Like imagine them working with H and R bloggers.
- [86:22]
Nick Rowan
Yeah, right. Yeah. So, you know, all those earnings, we, we've been, we've been praising them for, for the music, but the fact that they were also able to do, you know, the business side of the band while creating this music, that's impressive.
- [86:35]
Jeff Blair
That's a true. Part of the sort of punk aesthetic is diy do it all yourself. That's right. In a different era, they would have been pressing up their own vinyl like singles, you know, in the late 70s or something like that that, you know.
- [86:47]
Nick Rowan
Yeah.
- [86:49]
Jeff Blair
So you're saying.
- [86:51]
Nick Rowan
Oh, I was gonna say, unless we have something else, we can move on to Scott's favorite album.
- [86:55]
Jeff Blair
I was about to say, boy, what would you think if I were to tell you that one of Slater Kitty's two, maybe three most in interesting and exciting albums is also the most political album by far? One beat their post 911 record. I don't care. I don't care at all about that. What I care about is that there's just so much creative energy rolling on this record. There's a couple songs on this actually I don't like that much. But boy, I'll be. I'll be there anytime for a song like oh, which is just, you know, what is it? It's. Oh, you. It's going to be a light trifle. Right. You know, like. Oh, it's not really serious. So. No, it's just a beautiful love song. Nobody lingers like your hands on my heart Nobody figures you like you figured me out I'd be lying if I didn't say to you that no one comes close.
- [87:42]
Nick Rowan
It's just a.
- [87:44]
Jeff Blair
A beautiful lyric.
- [87:52]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Get yourself into some self control Play the game by putting on the brakes oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, oh Slow down and make less mistakes oh, nobody.
- [88:44]
Jeff Blair
She's actually writing to her husband. She's. I think, like, has a kid already at this point. Maybe. I don't even know. I. I think. Yeah, she's two kids with a guy. I can't even remember his name. He's like a documentary filmmaker.
- [88:55]
Nick Rowan
Lance Bangs, he's.
- [88:57]
Jeff Blair
There you go.
- [88:57]
Nick Rowan
Who's the guy who made Being John Mountain?
- [89:01]
Jeff Blair
Oh, Spike Jones.
- [89:03]
Nick Rowan
Yeah. Lance Bangs is Spike Jones's cinematographer.
- [89:07]
Jeff Blair
Well, that makes all the sense in the world then. Yeah. You know, I know him for the most random credit of all. He directed or co directed the Pavement documentary called Slow Century.
- [89:15]
Nick Rowan
Oh, nice.
- [89:16]
Jeff Blair
Yeah, these bands are all kind of pretty friendly.
- [89:18]
Scott Bertram
Yeah.
- [89:19]
Nick Rowan
Yeah.
- [89:19]
Jeff Blair
Circulate around in the same world, right? Yeah. So, like, there's that. And that's what. That's who I think this song is addressed to, actually. I just find their. The surprising inability. Surprising ability to handle some very serious and subjects without either descending into cliche or like, you know, clergy, you know, you know, radio crap.
- [89:40]
Scott Bertram
Right.
- [89:41]
Jeff Blair
But also, you know, somehow making everything just like, more interesting. And poor Patric that has any right to be. I find myself. I don't know, you guys have said you don't know who writes the lyrics, who writes the music. How is that collaboration work exactly? It's kind of mysterious. Maybe it's kind of the way Tom Waits always worked with his wife. Like, who's more responsible for what in that. The second half of the career. Who cares? It just works when it works so well. So, yeah, I do really enjoy a lot of the light songs on this record. Even though. Yes, there's a lot of politics as well.
- [90:25]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
I watch me fall with no expression at all.
- [90:35]
Nick Rowan
I really like the way that they handle 911 on far away by. She. Corinne Tucker frames it by. She says she's nursing her baby on the couch and watching it on TV, which I think was how most people experienced September 11th at a certain remove. You know, whether you're nursing your kid or making coffee or doing something else.
- [91:01]
Jeff Blair
Right.
- [91:02]
Nick Rowan
And. And. And I think that, you know, it's. It's not actually my favorite song on the record, but I think it has held up better than a lot of other 911 songs. Like, I think of like, Bruce Springenstein, My City of Ruin, which I never
- [91:18]
Scott Bertram
like that at all.
- [91:18]
Nick Rowan
Yeah, well. But, you know.
- [91:20]
Jeff Blair
Well, he was first of all he was right in about like Asbury Park.
- [91:23]
Nick Rowan
Yeah. And everybody repurposed it. You know, he played it at the, at the benefit concert. But like, I don't know even like, I don't know. Like Metric had an album a couple years later, their anti Iraq war album where I don't know, just that.
- [91:43]
Jeff Blair
American Idiot by Green Day. You know, the funny thing, the most powerful. The most powerful 911 record. And I do actually think of this as a category, the most powerful one is the one that wasn't even written about 911 and it was completed before and it was Yankee Hotel Foxtrot. Like I can't. I cannot hear a song like Jesus. Etc. Those lyrics about tall buildings shake voices escape singing sad sad songs. Like how did he know? Right? You know, but you're right. This, you know it definitely. This one is definitely way better than Neil Young doing let's Roll. I can tell you that much.
- [92:12]
Nick Rowan
Yes. Yeah.
- [92:13]
Jeff Blair
Yeah.
- [92:13]
Nick Rowan
I don't know because. Because she scales it down to the human level and like, yeah, she references Bush and her feelings about all that stuff, but that's not the center of it, of the song. And. And I think that's what makes it work and what makes it still work now.
- [92:49]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Yeah. And the President hides while working man Russian I give them knives. I look to the sky and ask it not to rain on the B tonight
- [93:17]
Scott Bertram
I got a lot to say here.
- [93:19]
Jeff Blair
So go for it, my friend.
- [93:21]
Scott Bertram
Interrupt me when you. When you wish. All right. A few things up front on the political angle of this record. I am being totally honest with you when I say it was years, years to this record before I even realized it. And I think I read it somewhere like, oh yeah, that's their 911 record. I'm like, really? And okay. When you go through with a fine tooth comb as we do for. For a show. Yeah. And I'll mention a few places here. Okay. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. There's.
- [93:47]
Jeff Blair
But it doesn't really. It's not heavy.
- [93:49]
Scott Bertram
It's really not. There is no reason you can't enjoy this record. You know, even if there are problems with. With the post 911 sort of. Sort of themes in a few songs.
- [93:59]
Jeff Blair
If you remember me celebrating the song Melt the Guns by XTC on an earlier episode.
- [94:04]
Scott Bertram
Way worse.
- [94:05]
Jeff Blair
That is way more offensive song than anything that Slater Kitty has ever written.
- [94:09]
Scott Bertram
And here's the other thing. Here's my big pitch to Jeff on. On this one since we have similar feel what I'm about to say. I think this is the best record I think One Beat is Slater Kinney at their absolute greatest. And the comparison I would make, Jeff, is that this is Slater Kinney's Yield by Pearl Jam.
- [94:30]
Jeff Blair
Oh, that's a great analogy.
- [94:32]
Scott Bertram
I know we both think that Yield is Pearl Jam's best record, even though many others would have other thoughts.
- [94:37]
Jeff Blair
But that little mellow moment where it just somehow all comes together for different reasons, songwriting.
- [94:44]
Scott Bertram
And I think one of the critiques that fans have is that it's, you know, it's. It's a little too accessible. It's. They're going a little bit more toward the mainstream. It's not quite as twirly as previous record. It's hard. It's hard to pull off an album like that. Yield's very accessible too. It's hard to make a record that good, that accessible while still being who you are. This album, I think, is immaculately sequenced to, which helps really well. All right, let me say a few things. It starts with the title track, One Beat. Janet Weiss on this tom, heavy drum pattern. Then each of the two guitars get introduced. Then vocals get introduced. I'm a bubble in a sound wave A sonic push for energy exploding like the sun. This song is all tension and there's no release whatsoever. And I think it's kind of like the platonic ideal of their vocal weaving and trading off. I love the way they bounce back and forth on this track. And it's their best song.
- [96:07]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
With the shape you make, your work for me is fusion, but it's real change and illusion. Could I turn this place upside down and shake you and your muscles out? If I'm sure you got to let me,
- [96:45]
Scott Bertram
Yeah. And so one beat comes to an end and there's no resolution. There's all this tension and far away, which Nick already talked a bit about. All it does is continue, continues. It carries over all that built up tension from one beat. And you hear the bashing drums and the dissonant guitar. And the song sort of slows to this part where there's just the two guitars playing and you think they might do something, but it heads back into that groove. It heads back into the tension. And then it slows again and this time it explodes into that big chorus. Don't breathe the air today don't speak of why you're afraid on top of that just machine of music underneath. Super powerful. And as Nick said, some of the things that she's singing about, like I look to the sky and ask it not to rain on my family tonight that's not A. That's not a line I picked up the first, you know, 24 times I heard the record. But now reading through, you see exactly what she's doing on a song like, like Far Away, O, which Jeff mentioned, that might be my favorite song in their whole catalog. Weiss is a.
- [97:51]
Jeff Blair
There you go. Right?
- [97:52]
Scott Bertram
Wow. Right? Weiss is a beast everywhere on this record, but particularly on. Oh, that riff lives in my head forever. It's perf. And again that, that back and forth. You know the way I feel when you call my name oh, oh, oh I see. You know, Carrie with like her leg up on a monitor playing that riff. It's just an outstanding.
- [98:32]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
It's all in my pocket. I don't mind, I don't mind, I don't mind. Come on now. I wish you.
- [99:06]
Scott Bertram
The remainder starts with like this White rabbit kind of shuffle, Jefferson Airplane kind of thing that also has some potential 911 type type illusions references. The sun was shining on us blinding me such that I couldn't see There was a hole beneath me, you watched me fall. Light rail Coyote. I'm going in order. Light rail coyote. Nick likes this one. I mentioned Pearl Jam. There's a very distinct moment in Light rail coyote at 205 in the song when they get very Pearl Jammy. I think it's, I think it's Hail. Hail. That's. They sort of like, I think borrow this little piece of Hail. Hail. Or is it I gotta go back and look at the gears. I could be wrong.
- [99:47]
Nick Rowan
They toured this out.
- [99:48]
Jeff Blair
Hail. Hail would be 95 way before, but
- [99:52]
Scott Bertram
it sounds real similar.
- [100:17]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Make our own water die we're five day play all night Hope we're not washed away.
- [100:29]
Scott Bertram
And then like I'm gonna step, step aside. Step Aside is a marvelous track. Oh, there's trumpets. It has this marching, strutting sort of feel to it. And, and the way that Corin sings this song is unbelievable. Know when she, you know, goes a little cheap trick on us and goes, you know, Janet, Carrie, can you feel it? How do you not get going when she shouts that out and as she gets to the, to the end, you know, when violence rules the world outside and the headlines make me want to cry. It's not the time to just keep quiet. Speak up one time to the beat and she just roars out to the beat, to the beat. That's a spine tingling moment, those first six songs. And it's everything past. This is good too with those first six. Six songs are just lined up so perfectly right. I, I, I think it's a Crowning achievement. Deepen in their career. And they're still good. Combat Rock is the most explicitly, you know, post.
- [102:13]
Jeff Blair
That's my least favorite song.
- [102:14]
Nick Rowan
Also my least favorite.
- [102:16]
Jeff Blair
And it's nothing. Nothing. The lyrics. I just don't like the melody.
- [102:20]
Nick Rowan
Yeah, they did a. They did another, you know, for the. The Rock Against Bush album. They did a song called off with your Head, which is not. It's not. It's not about executing Bush.
- [102:36]
Jeff Blair
Well, that's good to know.
- [102:37]
Nick Rowan
Yeah. But I feel like they should have put that song in place of Combat Rock.
- [102:59]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
And set up with my head. What's the use in knowing that the rest of your dead with the good? It's a faint if it's all you got there Father you have missed don't need proof that I exist you don't know I'm far away from those awful things you say.
- [103:20]
Jeff Blair
I think they just needed to make the Clash tribute, you know?
- [103:23]
Nick Rowan
Yeah, yeah, yeah. It just doesn't work for them.
- [103:25]
Jeff Blair
But, you know, again, the album, this one is one that stays strong all the way through the back half. By the way, another underappreciated point of. About Slater, Kenny. They never run over long on their records. The longest record I can is like 43 minutes. Sometimes they're even shorter than that. They know how to be brief. They never overstay their welcome. Scott, where are you going to finish?
- [103:45]
Scott Bertram
I was just gonna say the back half Sympathy is one of the bluesiest things they do. It reminds me a lot of what the Black Keys would do later on. The interaction between Carney and Auerbach, like just guitar and drum and how powerful that can be. It's the last song. Song on the record. And the one other thing I'll say and allow you guys to comment more if you like Funeral Song. I liked.
- [104:06]
Jeff Blair
That was the other one I was going to tell you.
- [104:08]
Scott Bertram
And the thing I thought about with Funeral Song is you had this. This post 911 record. And on Combat Rock specifically, there's these questions, like, where's the questioning? Where's the protest song? Talking about the scent, not treason. Okay. Feudal Song. You notice how often the line is repeated? The lines are repeated. Stay away from the burning house. Stay away from the burning house. Put it in the ground. Sing a funeral song. All these lines get repeated. That's the way a lot of those protest folk songs go. Right. So it's easier to sing along. You sing the same line twice. And funeral songs, a whole lot of these lines repeated one after the other. And then you get to this big Big, heavy, heavy chorus that I think fills in very well. But I noted that I was forever
- [104:51]
Jeff Blair
like my very own grave. That's a line that just always sticks with me.
- [104:55]
Scott Bertram
Yeah. So I think this is their best. I really do. And I, I, I commend it to everyone to give it a full listen.
- [105:02]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Put it in the ground Sing a funeral song Put it in the ground Sing a funeral song. Hey there now would you bury today? Burying the love that I'd hope would stay Nothing says forever like my very own grave there's nothing left to see Time out the Light.
- [105:49]
Jeff Blair
Make a really convincing argument. Nick, do you have any final thoughts on this record, or is it time for us to bravely move on into the woods?
- [105:57]
Nick Rowan
Let's move on into the woods, which is an album that Scott says is overrated.
- [106:04]
Jeff Blair
It's their Stephen Sondheim tribute, clearly. I mean, this is obviously.
- [106:08]
Nick Rowan
So we all.
- [106:09]
Jeff Blair
We all knew the Broadway musical. We did it in high school. A kid.
- [106:12]
Nick Rowan
Yeah, that's right. What I, What I can say just by way of biography about this album is they actually did make it in the woods. They went to upstate New York and were basically locked in a studio for a couple weeks and listened to nothing but Led Zeppelin.
- [106:35]
Jeff Blair
They got. They got the Flaming Lips producer to cover them. Who.
- [106:37]
Nick Rowan
That's right.
- [106:38]
Scott Bertram
Yeah.
- [106:38]
Nick Rowan
Yeah.
- [106:39]
Jeff Blair
It's like the loudest sounds along the planet and you're going to hear a lot of distortion on.
- [106:44]
Nick Rowan
And they. They gave him final cut too, which is not, you know, that they don't do that.
- [106:51]
Jeff Blair
That's a remarkable thing. I guess they must have really had a lot of confidence in him as a producer. Yeah, I guess they really like the softball.
- [106:58]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Yeah. It.
- [107:46]
Scott Bertram
Do you want me to tell you my problems and then you can respond?
- [107:49]
Jeff Blair
Yes. For the record, everybody. Everybody on planet Earth who has an opinion about Slater. Kenny loves this record.
- [107:58]
Scott Bertram
Except. Yeah, except me, apparently. I'm sure there's a few more. Like, there's dozens of us as.
- [108:02]
Jeff Blair
It's like the dude. Like Dances with Wolves Club, you know, that far side Cartoo.
- [108:06]
Scott Bertram
Yeah.
- [108:06]
Jeff Blair
Yeah. There's like five guys talking about how it was an inaccurate presentation of how Buffalo wounds did.
- [108:15]
Scott Bertram
I. So let's be clear about. About terms here. Overrated doesn't mean it's not good. I just don't think it's anywhere near their best record. And I. I have reasons. One of the main reasons is that that production, that. What are they doing with this? Where we have multiple records now, where we see a strength of the band is the way you hear Those guitars and the way you hear them interact and Janet Weiss is pushing them weave
- [108:49]
Jeff Blair
without pushing each other out of the way. It's never overloaded. It's never too complex.
- [108:54]
Scott Bertram
And so what do you have on the Woods? You have all of that obliterated by this muddy, compressed, blurry wall of noise. On virtually every song at least every song has a moment where things are pushed into the red and things are just smashed. And I.
- [109:14]
Jeff Blair
That's the Flaming Lips. Like, you know. You know, that's their signature. I don't know. Are you familiar with those songs? Like Cloud Clouds, Taste Metallic, a lot of that. Mid mid 90s flaming lips.
- [109:23]
Scott Bertram
Not that in particular.
- [109:25]
Jeff Blair
That's what he does. It's like. Like basically based on like an acid trip. Like your ears are overloaded. Everything's into red becomes. It becomes too large almost. It announces itself, it takes over.
- [109:51]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Sam. Hunger makes me a modern girl.
- [110:36]
Scott Bertram
I'm not completely opposed to that. I mean one of my. I. I love Weezer's Pinkerton. And there are places in Pinkerton where they shove that, you know, again, way into the red. I think it has a different function and form here on the woods that harms the songs and the songs themselves, themselves. Again, we're used to this very tight, these very precise guitar lines. You don't hear that as much here. The songs are longer, they're more jammy. You have a number of songs that are around five minutes here, which is forever and Slater Kitty time. You have let's Call It Love, which is an 11 minute long, indulgent thing at the end of the record and actually longer.
- [111:22]
Jeff Blair
None of you guys know the Fall? Anybody?
- [111:25]
Nick Rowan
I love the Fall.
- [111:26]
Jeff Blair
Okay, so do you have your Inspector versus Rector off of Dragnet? Yeah, that's what that song is. Directly nicking a line from let's Call It Love is that throb, the bonk, you know. And now it's the Fall. They do it and it's one of these lo fi recordings that sounds like it's a fever dream. Like you could barely half understand it. You have 101 degree temperature, you're lying in bed and it feels like you're having a semi nightmare. That's what I love about it because it's a hallucinator.
- [111:55]
Nick Rowan
You're totally stocked out,
- [112:04]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
My dear look at my face I've been waiting for you in the same old place I gotta lock down two Rose puts my lock down I locked down from hell. A woman is not a girl I can chill with this. It's not.
- [112:45]
Jeff Blair
That's not Scott's thing.
- [112:46]
Scott Bertram
I know. I'll make one more point.
- [112:48]
Nick Rowan
It's also not Sleeter Kenny's thing.
- [112:49]
Scott Bertram
No, I don't think it is. I'll make one more point on. You guys can tell me why I'm wrong. So here's. I'm going to ask you again, Royal you a question as to whether or not you're going to like the Woods. So there's a song called Roller Coaster here and around a minute, 50 seconds into roller Coaster for no. I mean, no particular reason. I'm sure they had a reason. There's no particular. It says if someone accidentally shoves the fader up on the mixer and the drums come, come up extremely loud and take over the song. And you're listening and it's as if you have thrown six pairs of shoes into a dryer and they begin to tumble around and that's all you hear is, If you like that, you might like the Woods. If you think that's a little much of a sonic overload again, that obliterates the rest of the music that's happening around it, then maybe you're on Team Scott when it comes to the interpretation of the Woods.
- [114:35]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
One day is a bit of a Stay with me. All these things could get better. We had a good time at the beginning.
- [114:58]
Jeff Blair
I was going to say, I'm on Team Scott in that one respect. There is one song here that particularly stands out to me as a song that's ruined by the sort of intentionally weird production, and that's Carrie, song one called Modern Girl.
- [115:10]
Scott Bertram
Absolutely.
- [115:11]
Nick Rowan
Yes.
- [115:12]
Jeff Blair
It's a nice pop tune. Right. But you listen to the song. I. I at first was like, is this song glitching out? Is it like a bad upload to YouTube or something like that? Because I'm watching it on YouTube. So it's official, right? No, it's just for whatever reason, they decided to make it more hissy and, like, lo fi as the song goes along. And then, like, by the end of it, it's like, there's a good melody there, there's even some good performances. It's just drowned out by the way it's produced. And I don't understand.
- [115:53]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
All night like a picture of sunny day.
- [116:08]
Nick Rowan
That song, I think, is one of those things where you write a beautiful, sweet and melancholy song and then you get a producer who wants to put, you know, almost like an ironic spin.
- [116:21]
Jeff Blair
Yes. They have to dress it up. But you came in be this happy.
- [116:24]
Nick Rowan
You can't play this straight. If you play it straight. No One will take it seriously. I disagree. I. I think that the song would be, you know, wildly improved if they had just been allowed to play it the way they would have played it. But, you know, this, this. This freaky production method. I think it really works on what's mine is yours.
- [116:46]
Jeff Blair
Yes. It's. That's the Led Zeppelin big tribal drum, big stomper. Yeah. The full bonzo.
- [116:52]
Nick Rowan
Yeah. And. And I just love the way that the song just collapses in the middle and then they have to put it back together for the last 40 seconds. That. I don't know. That's the standout track here for.
- [117:22]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Sit down on it. Let's kill some time Rest your head on this autumn. Let's hang around let's break the.
- [117:58]
Jeff Blair
Me that it's that. And it's also Jumpers, which I think was a single, but I wouldn't have known.
- [118:03]
Scott Bertram
Yeah, they made a video for it. So.
- [118:05]
Jeff Blair
Yes, it has that feel to it though. But I really like again, just nervous rattling energy and yeah, with. I think the way I characterize this album overall is it has a stronger hard rock sound now that Dave Friedman. I don't know. But yeah, I do like it. I. I do not. Like I noticed the flaws. Right. There are things like you might not like. Let's call it Love nightlight. It's a two part song and of course one of them is 11 minutes long. It's all one take. But to me it actually works quite well if you. If you're into a slower kind of a doomy mode. The other thing I have to talk about is like how I think your other influences are finding their way into this band. New influences in the sense it's like new stuff on the scene. I think of it more as just like they're going back and getting deeper into the weirder corners of post punk from the early 80s. And a lot of. I hear a lot of Killing Joke in this music, which is these sort of doomy tribal stomps that you wouldn't actually associate with Slater Kenny.
- [119:01]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
That is a bridge of dawn and faint, the golden spine of engineering whose back is heavy with my weight lo the cloud.
- [119:45]
Jeff Blair
I hear a lot of other. Like late Echo of the Bunnyman is another one I have here in my notes. And yes, there's that overwhelming hard rock sound which actually makes it. It's what saves this record. Record, actually. It's not Ponderous. It feels more playful than ponderous. And that's what I like about a song like what's mine is yours. But again, there are divisive tracks on this record. I think Roller Coaster is really great, but Scott, as he tells me, it's just a piece of crap mix. There's nothing. Is there some weird thing going on there that I don't understand either? But I do like it. I think it's probably the most underrated thing on the record.
- [120:18]
Scott Bertram
Weirdly, you guys haven't mentioned the two songs that I actually. Actually kind of like. Because like I said, it's not. It's not. It's not. I don't think it's bad. I think there's problems. I like the first song. I like the Fox.
- [120:29]
Jeff Blair
Sure.
- [120:30]
Scott Bertram
Distorted from the start. Right. So there's no doubt where we're going with this record, but this sort of this. The story about a duck and a fox and the duck is born.
- [120:37]
Jeff Blair
Yes, it is that.
- [120:38]
Scott Bertram
The fox is trying to lure the duck onto land so he can eat it. And the duck thinks, oh, this is so nice. And he says, oh, fox, is this love? Can you tell me what. What is love? But eventually the duck smartens up and the duck realizes, you know, I'm gonna stay here in the water.
- [120:54]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Duck came up on to the land. The fox was watching. He just laughed. I could show you some shiny tricks. He said, come along, we'll get our kicks. He said, let go, let go for me.
- [121:42]
Scott Bertram
And the other one I like is. Is entertainables entertainment you guys haven't mentioned.
- [121:47]
Jeff Blair
I.
- [121:47]
Scott Bertram
That's one of the highlights. I think it's a good. It's the best mesh they are able to get here of the heavy hitting, the loudness, but also that contains some of the joy and exuberance that the band naturally brings to a lot of their music. There's some really fine guitar lines that I hear. There's some like string bending that's happening in places in entertainment. Still, though, five minutes. I would have cut, you know, a little bit off. But the Fox and entertain, those are two. I think those are my two favorite songs. On the woods.
- [122:35]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
And now. Your heart is done. Join the ranking.
- [123:00]
Nick Rowan
The sort of guttural yelling that Tucker does on the Fox is really great.
- [123:07]
Jeff Blair
I have to say. I return to this. I'm impressed with her voice. Her voice. Not only has. She can. She can ulate with the best of a man, she can. She can give you a blood curdling scream right up there with Exi and Savanka. As I said, it's just like you sound like you're. You're like a Valkyrie basically saying you're doomed. She really raises her volume and gets into that angry mode. I love it so much. It's just. It's one of those mod that actually I don't really often get to hear. Kind of filled in my rock listening schedule because it's just, you know, not the kind of groups I normally used to listen to. But I don't know if, whether you, Nick, or maybe you, Scott, would like to explain what happens next, because I really don't know what explains the 10 year gap that comes between.
- [123:54]
Scott Bertram
Nick, read the book. Nick can tell us.
- [123:56]
Nick Rowan
The book. The book. The book is a good place to go for this one.
- [124:00]
Jeff Blair
All right. They take 10 years off before their next record. Explains. Explain Nick.
- [124:04]
Nick Rowan
So they toured this record in 2006, and Brownstein developed shingles on the tour.
- [124:14]
Jeff Blair
That's terrible.
- [124:15]
Nick Rowan
And Weiss had never had chickenpox as a child, so they had to be separated from each other.
- [124:22]
Jeff Blair
That's funny. Okay, funny.
- [124:24]
Nick Rowan
But, like, you know, that's not. That's no way to run a tour.
- [124:28]
Jeff Blair
Could they even play on stage? I mean, I guess.
- [124:30]
Nick Rowan
No, they. They could, they could, but, you know, it's like airborne and great sweat. Partic doctors, you know, it was. And they had to go to Europe. It was a whole thing.
- [124:40]
Jeff Blair
Yeah, I can imagine. I don't know.
- [124:42]
Nick Rowan
And then Tucker had two kids at that point, and that makes the most sense. Basically said, I can't keep touring. This is nuts. And so they took a break. They said, okay, we're going to take a break. But then they all started going different ways. You know, Tucker had her kids, they all had side bands. Brownstein did Portlandia, and when did it.
- [125:09]
Jeff Blair
When did Portlandia begin?
- [125:10]
Nick Rowan
So 2010 was.
- [125:12]
Jeff Blair
Oh, wow. So, yes, she was definitely, well, in Scotston.
- [125:15]
Nick Rowan
How about that way into Portlandia at that point. What I don't get, and because the book came out right before they got back together, is why did they get back together? I don't. I don't really have a clear answer on that. I. Generally speaking, bands getting back together, I don't like. Like, when LCD sound system got back together, I was not a fan of that.
- [125:37]
Jeff Blair
But was it American Dream?
- [125:39]
Nick Rowan
Was the album right, in 2017? Yeah.
- [125:41]
Jeff Blair
Well, that would have been easier to stomach if he hadn't made such a big production about retiring in the first place. You know, the entire, like, MSG film concert. Goodbye, you'll miss us. Don't you wish you were as cool
- [125:53]
Scott Bertram
as we were by and then.
- [125:55]
Jeff Blair
Yeah, oh, yeah. I got more.
- [125:56]
Nick Rowan
Come back and you make, like, a mediocre album.
- [125:58]
Scott Bertram
Like, okay, cool.
- [126:02]
Jeff Blair
Right. If you were there, like I did it feel like this because I. I don't get any kind of tired retirement vibes off of this album. That's maybe a strange thing to say. I think no Cities to Love, this is a 10 year layoff record. It shows very clear signs of having taken 10 years to fully write all to its benefit. I just don't think there's a lot of casual mistakes here. There's nothing rushed. It isn't one of their greatest record. I think it's like a really solid B plus record. And in a lot of ways, I suppose it's the end of. It's the end of this, the era of Slater Kenny that I think most people think of the trio era. Gina west is going to play on the next album, but she's not going to be the same part of its creativity. It's Genesis that she was. And I think maybe the fact that this took 10 years to make is part of the reason why. Because it was easier for the. For the two lead songwriters to just work in conjunction with one another and cut out a member of the loop. But we'll talk about that later. I still have to say, I think no Cities to Love is pretty damn good.
- [127:33]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
The dark world is precious to me My scars make me breathing so deep
- [127:42]
Jeff Blair
this is not like one of those. We're on the downslope now and everything's going to be bad from here. I love Fangless in particular. Fangless and Surface Envy again as the Sonic Youth has broken up, by the way, at this point. They broke up in 2011. So this is the first record they put out after that. Right. And it feels like they're just picking up where they left off that riff, making this the. I'm thinking of it like when you hear your service envy and you back it up with something from goo, which is to say one of Sonic Youth albums. You just might as well be taking A sides and B sides from one another. Especially because you have that Kim Gordon vocal style approach.
- [128:25]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Savior Imagine a man. But I know that you made me I'm sick for you I'm the rapid God and your life rearranged me Will break me down But I'm not undone Done.
- [128:58]
Jeff Blair
But man, I. I like this. And I also like their appreciation of irony. There's a song on here called no Anthems, which of course, nevertheless is a giant anthem. The most anthemic thing on the album with a big ass stadium rock chorus. I love it. Well, did not fail me at all. I mean, hey, darling, you know It's a rather personal song, but, boy, it just gives me that Blondie vibe. I love that Blondie vibe that they're coming up with. This is a new. It's not the way they originally sounded, but they seem to be able to have a lighter touch with this one. Anyways, I don't know how you guys think about this. Again, I'm new to the whole story.
- [129:50]
Scott Bertram
I, I think it's really good. I I have it a cut below. You know, my, my favorites. I I It's not as good as One beat. It's not as good as. It's not as good as, as Dig Me Out. Of course, I think it's better than the Woods. I think it's a more fitting, formal end to the, to the Weiss era to say no Cities To Love is, is the capper. They do a couple interesting things here, Jeff, and you, you touched, touched on one of them, which I'll start with. So in those 10 years, maybe it took those 10 years. They're writing out of this world choruses on this record. I mean, no anthems, you said it's the most anthemic thing, I don't think. I think Surface Envy is the most anthemic thing on this record. This is.
- [130:33]
Jeff Blair
I could have nominated no Cities to Love as well. The title track, Art Pop out the wazoo. It's just so pleasant.
- [130:39]
Scott Bertram
I mean, Surface Envy is an arena rock song, and the chorus is, we win, we lose. Only together do we break the rule. That is incredibly anthemic. They're writing huge choruses on this record.
- [130:51]
Jeff Blair
All Power. The Puff Girls theme song, right?
- [130:53]
Scott Bertram
Yeah.
- [130:53]
Jeff Blair
Yeah.
- [130:54]
Scott Bertram
And, and so, I mean, Surface Envy is, is one that was born to be played in stadiums or at least, you know, big clubs.
- [131:24]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Only together do we break the rule. We win, we lose. Only together do we.
- [131:38]
Scott Bertram
The other thing that they do here, and I don't remember hearing this trick previously. If you guys do and I'm wrong, tell me, tell me. You listen to songs on no Cities to Love and you. What you begin to hear is that those guitars aren't interacting the way they used to. And at least to my ear, what it sounds like is you don't, you don't have one of them. And again, as I said, I don't know which one. You don't have one of them. I'm going to not maybe use the right words here, but one of them is of kind, kind of tuned down to sound very bass. Like, in the mix.
- [132:07]
Nick Rowan
It essentially is the bass, right?
- [132:09]
Scott Bertram
And there are songs like.
- [132:11]
Jeff Blair
That's how they get their bottom line. That's what I noticed immediately on like Dig Me out all the way back then.
- [132:15]
Scott Bertram
Right.
- [132:15]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
But.
- [132:15]
Scott Bertram
But this one, I think it's just very apparent, like on.
- [132:19]
Nick Rowan
You would think it is a bass if you didn't know better.
- [132:21]
Scott Bertram
Yes, a new wave. A new wave is basically a bass, forward bass. First song without a bass guitar being played. And there are a number of tracks here in which that's the case in which that guitar that sounds bassy has a much more prominent position and it's also not interacting with that other guitar the way they did a decade and 15 years previously.
- [133:05]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Sometimes the heat of the crowd feels a little too close Sometimes the shad of the room makes me feel so alone.
- [133:22]
Scott Bertram
I don't think there's anything wrong with that. I think that's a far more natural progression of their song than what they tried to do on the woods, which is why this is a much better cap. And if you want Zeppelin esque stuff, go to the best song on this record which is Bury Our Friends. That's a page Zeppelin heavy song pulsing with energy. Exhume our idols and bury our friends we're wild and weary but we won't give in again Anthemic stuff on this record and I like it a lot. The last thing I'll say is they're going to go on and we're going to talk about Weiss in a second. It's. I think they may have thought that was going to be a one and done. You hear Fade, the last song of
- [134:05]
Jeff Blair
this record which does feel like an end.
- [134:07]
Scott Bertram
This big thing coming to an end. If we are truly dancing our swan song Darling, shake it like never before the very last line oh, the price oh, what a price we paid My dearest nightmare My. My conscience the end. It certainly feels to me like they anticipated that it just might be one more record. They put everything they had into it. They wrote these massive choruses, they wrote these great songs. There's not a down song on this record. You know this guys. There's not a not. I don't want to say a torch bellad, but everything is up temp.
- [134:39]
Jeff Blair
There will be torch ballads, believe it or not, later on in their career, but there's nothing like that, nothing like that here.
- [134:44]
Scott Bertram
And this to me is a fine, fine send off for the band that as we'll talk about in a moment, it really is for me where I jump off the ship for various reasons, but it's a great way to end.
- [135:11]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
All of the world that we pray. My dearest Nightmares like yourself.
- [135:43]
Jeff Blair
I really want to point out that how lightly this band wears hard rock on its shoulders, which is just a surprise because, yes, it's a girl group, right? I mean, are they going to be able to rock out as hard as Jimmy Page, John Bonham, Robert Plant, John Paul Jones? As it turns out.
- [136:01]
Nick Rowan
Yeah.
- [136:01]
Jeff Blair
In an updated way, they do not feel either fake or. Again, what. I mentioned this before. There's nothing pondered about their attempts to work within that kind of sonic world. They actually become, like, more sprightly. They bring it off with a verve. They bring it off with sort of a. Yeah, we know we're playing with these cliches that. These old tropes that we grew up on ourselves, but we have our own little, like, spin on them. And I really appreciate that about Slater, Kenny. I was. Again, I just go back to what I said at the start of the show. I was kind of afraid that, like, are these overpraised people? Is this, like, you know, something that was too. Too hip not to, you know, elevate? But, no, it's really not the case. This music is so satisfying, and even when it's heavy, it's light. And I guess the sad thing is, is that this album, no Cities to Love, kind of represents the end of that point in their career.
- [136:56]
Nick Rowan
My thought on it is I like it. I. I like no anthems. I like surface density. I think the title track is good. I think what I find interesting about it is this is clearly the work of people who have played stadiums, you know, and. And they had. Not up until, I don't think, until One Beat they had. You know, they toured with Pearl Jam. They were the opening band. Yeah.
- [137:25]
Jeff Blair
2001 tour.
- [137:27]
Nick Rowan
You know, you couldn't write choruses like this unless you have played for really big audiences that are really getting into your stuff. And so I. I find it really interesting in that sense that they take a break for 10 years, and when they come back, they. I don't know, like, intuitively realize we have a much bigger audience now than when we left, which I don't think most bands can say. And so they play to it. And they play to it well, you
- [138:01]
Jeff Blair
think they had a lot of conversations between one another about how they were kind of coasting off of Carrie Brownstein's comic chops on tv, like, when she goes off, gets that separate career, and then, like, every critic on the planet
- [138:14]
Scott Bertram
is like, this is the greatest show.
- [138:15]
Jeff Blair
By the way you guys talked about. You said you didn't much care for it. Boy, Portlandia was a very special thing in my life, in my wife's life, of course. My wife just loved Carrie Brownstein. She's like, you know, almost like spirit animal. There's. This is one great sketch where, like, they're trying to do their, like, wildlife trip, and then all of a sudden, Carrie kind of, like, goes over the horizon and immediately pan panics. She's like, oh, what can I do?
- [138:39]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Why?
- [138:39]
Jeff Blair
Because it's a fleece vest store, and they're gonna just go running and buy the best, best fleece vests and, like, outdoor gear that they can. It's hilarious. This stuff was comedically hilarious. And again, you watched it and you thought, oh, yeah, that's the girl in that band that I've never gotten around to listening to. And then they come out with this, and then. Yeah, you're saying, Nick.
- [139:01]
Nick Rowan
Oh, I, I, I actually do think one Portlandia sketch sketch is pretty funny. It maybe even be from the first episode. Do you remember when they buy the chicken?
- [139:10]
Jeff Blair
Yes, I've seen every episode. We're big fans of it. Right. So, yeah, the one that had to make sure that, you know, it's properly sourced and it was well loved, and before they could slaughter it, they're sitting there at the table before they can make their order. But doing it.
- [139:22]
Nick Rowan
Yes, my wife has done that. She went out to the farm and selected her chicken and then watched. And then ate it, watched it get decapitated, and then, oh, my Lord. And, you know, take the feathers off, Packaged up, brought it home. So, you know, I can criticize Portlandia, but I am living it.
- [139:44]
Jeff Blair
Hey, but you know what? It probably tasted pretty good.
- [139:47]
Nick Rowan
Oh, it's excellent.
- [139:48]
Jeff Blair
It is. It is. This, of course, brings us to the weird post Janet period of Slater Kinney's career. And the story is actually, I think, a pretty awkward one. Right. They start putting together new music. It's 2019, so we're about four years on from no Cities to Love. Right, right. Except that, you know, Corinne and Carrie have now taken to working remotely, I think. I don't know, one of them's living in one place and the other one's the other, and they're just sort of, like, swapping ideas via Dropbox. Basically. They're coming up with these things and they're assembling songs. There's no room in that kind of creative process for a third person. And the thing is, is that we think about Slater Kenny as being a trio, but the trio, the truth is, Janet Weiss joined a little bit later. Tellingly, by the time they were actually first getting great. But this thing originally began as a partnership. I mean, even a romantic partnership, for that matter. A personal songwriting partnership and a bond that apparently these people are going to share forever. And that I guess in the way is it. Something reminds me the story of Genesis. Genesis has always faded to shrink lose members. So too Slater Kenny was probably always slated to go back to. To a duo. Those two people writing with each other. And of course everybody very. I think fairly says that these next few albums the center won't hold, which is the first one that Janet plays on. Beyond that though Path of Wellness and Little Rope that they're just not the same as the rest of Slater Kinney's career. And they're right. But I still do think there are some good things to say about this music. The most obvious thing to start with is. Is their sound profoundly and interestingly changes when they get a new producer who is quite the collaborator as well as a producer. And that is a person, you know, you might know. Nick, I got no idea but who St. Vincent is. You said that you actually liked her music in her own world. And I don't know anything about this entire scene. So maybe you want to start with me. About the center won't hold. Janet plays as a studio drummer. Basically told just play what we've already written for you. And this is very much played by St. Vincent as a producer. And I guess I can't help but notice that this the first time I hear a song on an album and I think that sounds a lot like Madonna. That might not be a good sign. What do you think?
- [142:23]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
I need a quick injection to get you out of my way Any real affliction gives me rising St. I need a new reflection don't want to see my face
- [142:49]
Nick Rowan
yeah, like Madonna. Yeah, that's not a good sign.
- [142:52]
Jeff Blair
Reach Out. Reach out is a Madonna song. I like it though. It's a Madonna song.
- [142:56]
Nick Rowan
But so about. About St. Vincent. Have either of you guys listened to. To her very much?
- [143:02]
Scott Bertram
No.
- [143:02]
Jeff Blair
No. I'm completely ignorant. You. You indicated that you knew something about her and that's. Yeah.
- [143:07]
Nick Rowan
So when I was in. When I was in high school, I loved her. So Annie Clark is her name. Her Stage name is St. Vincent. She got. Got her start as she was in Suan Stevens's band. So, you know, does she play on
- [143:24]
Jeff Blair
Come On Feel the Illinois?
- [143:27]
Nick Rowan
I believe so. She was not. She's not you. Obviously she's not his band anymore. But, you know, so she. She came up in. In a very twee World, we could say. But her actual music is quite good. It's, it's, you know, it's. It's very experimental. You know, it. It looks like it's been put through a machine. It comes out sounding inhuman sometimes. But she had two. She had two albums that came out around the same time as she got involved with Slater Kenny. The first one is self titled St. Vincent. And then the. The second one is called Mattress Mass Seduction. And they are so.
- [144:14]
Jeff Blair
Because I was so checked out of pop music at this period, you're just gonna have to tell me these, like, get any reputation. Do they play any radio singles or are they just like interesting art rock things that kind of like Pitchfork?
- [144:25]
Nick Rowan
They were. They. Pitchfork loved them, right? David Byrne is a Great Champion of St. Vincent. He did an album with her. He thought that, you know, she. She's it. She's the next big thing. And when you hear at the center won't hold, what you're listening to is St. Vincent. You're not listening to Slater Kenny anymore.
- [145:03]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
When I looked down I was a mess My face was smeared my clothes were wet my shoes untied stone in my chest I was step on the shore again Reach out touch me stuck on the edge Reach out darkness is wedding again
- [145:51]
Nick Rowan
and I don't know, know works fine for her. Like she has a song called. Called Huey Newton on her self titled album that is, you know, just a bunch of like weird bips and bloops until she comes in with this incredible powerful guitar riff. I hearing hearing weird electronic influences. And what I think of as a rock band is alienating to me as. As a f. Previous stuff. But I think actually that it's very likely that there is a whole new group of fans who like St. Vincent who come to this stuff and feel differently about it. I'm just not one of those people.
- [146:44]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Raised outside the city Came up in the mud needed something Phone slipped you my address called the doctor take me out of this mess Turn it down to the ease turn the answer to an a basement of own a mission to begin you and me Strings and a melody it took a little while but now I'll see you.
- [147:27]
Jeff Blair
So it's interesting. I'm completely unaware of any of the context, any of the background, any of the history. I have no problem with any of that stuff. Keep in mind, I'm also a huge fan of a lot of dance pop bands, New Order. In fact, that's what I wrote down here in my notes. I love New Order. I love all the kind of rich radio Pop stuff. It's just that it. It sounds stranger and different. There's. There's songs on this thing that are almost designed to divide the. The center hold, the title track is exactly the sort of tune that's going to divide you. Long drone. You've got more echo in the Bunnyman Killing joke going on than whatever they were doing in their old art rock. Ruins is the same that Gonna Leave the Light On. Chorus is just nasty. It's minor key in it. It's sludge slow. But you know what? I think it plods along fairly convincingly. Eat the.
- [148:15]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
That. Things eat the weak and devour the monsters.
- [148:52]
Jeff Blair
The electronic nature of these songs probably worsens them just because it feels like they've stepped outside their comfort zone without a reason for doing it. But I don't. I don't mind like the Madonna pop. I like Reach Out. I like Can I Go On. That's a really nice pop song. Just about being old and over it all. But the thing is, these songs were always so composed that there's just no space for Weiss on them, you know, and the drumming is very clearly less interesting on this record, and which in its way is a clear. A clear compliment to, like, how much he had already contributed before without maybe even being credited for it. Broken, by the way. That's the last on the album. This is what I mean. I say they would start writing piano ballads. I mean, that's like. It's very, very beautiful song, but it's very much a trad ballad. It's, you know, a love story song. Right. It's probably the. The last thing you would have expected Slater Kenny to do.
- [149:45]
Scott Bertram
Yeah, I. I've maybe spun each of these two times, three times. Did it again in preparation for the show. And it's a different feel. I think Nick's interpretation is. Is. Is pretty accurate. They're talented songwriters. They're talented musicians. It's not to say that there's not some quality in places or some. So you mentioned Ruins from the Center Won't hold. I like that song. There's a song on Path of Wellness, which is the second postwife's record, Cinema Hold. She played on. You know what I'm. Where she had no input. There's one called down the Line there that I think is pretty good. And actually the most recent one called Little Rope, which was just after. Was it Death of Someone in Tucker's family and she was using the record.
- [150:32]
Nick Rowan
It was Brownstein's family.
- [150:34]
Scott Bertram
Thank you.
- [150:35]
Nick Rowan
Her mom died in a car crash.
- [150:37]
Scott Bertram
Yeah. And so she's working through a lot of that. There's a song on Little Rope called Hunt yout Down. That's my favorite song by a significant margin from, I think, these three records. And so that led me to give Little Rope a little bit more of a chance. And I still didn't hear enough of a difference. Didn't hear things that were grabbing me in places. But that one, the thing you fear the most will hunt you down is the. Is the line on that. I, I, I think that's the best song from these last three. From these last three records.
- [151:10]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Hey, get ready I've been down so long I pay rent to the floor I'm running out of thought I'm unsteady Then crawling around here for days and hopes the worlds open up and give way Call me home I forgive you I wish I told you so no other ways to go with words left to me I send you ashes My love the thing you feel the most with love.
- [152:02]
Nick Rowan
I'm trying to think of a single. I'm looking through this track list here. I'm not sure there's a single one of these songs that really stuck out to me.
- [152:12]
Jeff Blair
See, I don't know. I don't think it all just falls apart. And it's funny because I'm the one who's new to all this. It's like you guys are like the spirit in the heart. Went out of the band as one who was there and knows. It's like, I don't know anything. I see them obviously making a clear change in sound, but some of these melodies are still worthy.
- [152:30]
Nick Rowan
Well, you know, it's. It's not that I don't like it. Like, I. It's just that it kind of all, like, I think of. Path of Wellness is probably the. The album where this happens the most, where it kind of just kind of blends into itself. This one song is indistinguishable from the next.
- [152:48]
Jeff Blair
Therapy Speak is what it is. The path of wellness is just sort of like clergy therapy gunk.
- [152:54]
Nick Rowan
Well, I mean, they do do some of that lyrically.
- [152:57]
Jeff Blair
Yeah. Method. Actually, that's the one. One song on that record. I do appreciate where she says, like, she's singing about love, but of course it sounds like hate. I mean, she's a method.
- [153:12]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Kindness, maybe. Could you be a little helpful making your place? Oh, yeah I'm down on my knees I'm singing a song about love and I'm singing about hate I'm singing here I'm singing about love I'm singing my Love.
- [153:47]
Jeff Blair
And then, of course, we have Little Rope, which is actually not that long ago. Two years ago. Delightful cover. But I just, again, whatever criticisms you would have applied to the path of wellness, I think apply equally here. It's also the one, I'll confess, remember, I'm new to all this. It's the one I've listened to the least. So you'll forgive me if I tell you it probably makes the least impression upon on me at this point.
- [154:11]
Nick Rowan
I guess I can say when this album was announced, I was not excited for it.
- [154:19]
Jeff Blair
Was it the first time you're like, oh, it's just, yeah, we know where
- [154:22]
Nick Rowan
this is going Well, I mean, so, yeah. And I don't know, I have to wonder a little bit about how much has Portlandia influenced the way that these people are making music now? Is it. Well, so Portlandia is a show that pokes gentle fun at the sort of scene that Slater Canning came up in. But to continue to be a band after all of that, I don't know, I wonder, like, how much of this feels like play acting.
- [155:08]
Jeff Blair
I remember, I seem to remember Carrie Brownstein and Fred Arms and saying, like, at a certain point, we knew we had to kind of end this show because, well, a couple reasons. One, because, like, jokes were landing too hard and, like, people were actually turning on them saying, like, you can't make fun of us anymore. You talk about you sniveling in grace, you know, like, Right, Yes. But, like, like, yeah, I think you some of that will probably affect. There's a more jaded approach to the music scene than had ever been there before. They, they realize the political demands that have now been made upon them because of their prominence and their fame. And of course, the funny thing about Portlandia is, like, Corinne Tucker's just kind of getting dragged into that. That was Carrie Brownstein. Just like, I like, I like doing comedy. I like doing sketch stuff. This guy, Fred Arms and really, like, clicks with me. And of course, she's just sort of, like, yanked into it, despite the fact that there's no necess. Has Karin Tucker ever even appeared on Portland?
- [156:04]
Nick Rowan
No, I, I think, I think Janet Weiss is on the show every now and again, but.
- [156:10]
Jeff Blair
Exactly. So, like, I, I don't know how that must have changed the energy of the group, but I, I, I don't think it really ruined it. I think maybe what happens is the inevitability of change in an industry that it's just clear. That's the other fact. I actually don't know the full story about how record industry issues might have affected Slater Kenny. They were always pretty much diy, which of course meant they never really said that much. They were not a big commercial success. Maybe in an era where, you know, rock and roll begins to feel more and more outdated, there. There was no quite. There was no path forward for Slater Kenny that wouldn't feel inevitable. A bit like comp. I think these last few records are good. They're not great, and they do seem to miss something. They became central to the chemical, the alchemy of the band when they were a three piece.
- [157:01]
Scott Bertram
All right, I think that's where we end things here on the story of Slater Kinney. Thank our guest Nick Rowan for being along with us. It is part of the program where we tell you the two albums you should own. The five songs you written really have to hear from Slater Kinney. And Nick, who's managing editor of the Lamp, goes first. Nick, the floor is yours.
- [157:23]
Nick Rowan
And I am on the spot. So I have said it already that my favorite album is Dig Me Out. If you're going to start anywhere with this band, that's where you should start. And I think if I had to pick a number, number two album that you should go to, it would be One Beat. So in terms of five songs,
- [157:53]
Jeff Blair
I
- [157:53]
Nick Rowan
would say my favorite track from Slater Kenny is one Beat. And then it's really hard for me to choose off of Dig Me out, what the. You know, what the essential song there is, because they all feel essential. But I'm going to say turn it on and then to go back one album further. Little Mouth is a song that both I and my wife really love. So that's a special one for me. And I mentioned earlier that Light Rail Coyote is a favorite. I'm up to four here. And gosh, to pick.
- [158:43]
Jeff Blair
You understand that a guy is literally going to just jump out of your computer screen and like, beat you up if you actually go to six. Like, you have to be very careful here.
- [158:51]
Nick Rowan
I. Look, I. I've. I've already picked every song on Dig Me Out.
- [158:55]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Right.
- [158:57]
Jeff Blair
Well, I have a. I have a way to deal with these problems. You'll. You'll see.
- [159:01]
Nick Rowan
Oh, all right. All right. Anyway, yeah, my last song as Burn Don't Freeze.
- [159:05]
Jeff Blair
Yes. Scott.
- [159:07]
Scott Bertram
All right. I didn't think that we'd end up in this way, but we do have the same two albums. Dig Me out and One Beat are my two albums. So that's a. That's a second on that. On those nominations, my songs I'll go way no way Back. But I go toward the beginning and pick Want to be your Joey Ramone, that one that really captures that. That, that. That energy of early Slater Kinney, the great hook. I also say turn it, Turn it on. The title track from All Hands on the Bad one O for sure from One Beat, which might be their best. And then I. I hesitated between picking a second song from One Beat and one from. From later on, but I'm just going to say step aside with those horns, man. Step aside is when you've got to hear. That's my fifth song on my list, Jeff.
- [160:04]
Jeff Blair
Okay, so I'm going to give you a list that will obviously change if you were to ask me this a year from now because I'm so new to this band. But again, I could do the obvious and I'll say the two albums for me have to be Dig Me out and the Hot Rock. That's a one, two punch. They come right after the other. And that's great because that means I won't have to name a single song from those records. Records. I really do believe those records should just be heard as holes. They're no weak spots. They are really interesting. Gosh, it's something new. Something new that I regret having missed. And now to go back to the original five songs that I would choose. These are not from those two albums. So I guess from their earliest career, I'd start with two songs from Call the Doctor, which is Hubcap, a really great pop song. And then Anonymous, which I think actually gets to the heart of their literary song, slash creative slash psychological conceits. The sorts of fears and panics that. That Carrie Brownstein and Corinne Tucker are hiding behind their music. It's such a smart song. Again, it was the song that made me first think, oh, this is Virginia Woolf in musical form. My third song will be oh, since we're skipping, we're skipping all the way forward. I gotta tell you that. Oh, might be a silly song. It might be one, one too many things about the Love. But I still think that this is a record that doesn't really get enough appreciation for. For how light hearted is possible it can be. Last ones I've got here, okay, from the Woods Chompers single. And then I guess from the. Our final album, which I guess the final Slater Kenny album. Well, we can talk about what happens after the Center World hold, but I guess I'm going to call for no Anthems from no Cities to Love, a title that explicitly lies because it gives you one of the most anthemic choruses these guys, these girls ever wrote. And that's really the hand of the miracle. Slater Kenny It's a girl band, it's obvious, but it never feels like they insist on it. What they insist on is their talent, and their talent actually is just undenia.
- [162:16]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Doesn't anthem say the song of me but now there are no heavens the more I can hear is the echo and the ring. I want an anthem, a singer, the F of an answer and a force to feel Riddle and silent, a weapon of all its power.
- [162:41]
Scott Bertram
Power source There we go. It's the Political Beats. Look at the music and career of Slater Kinney. We thank our guest on the program, Nick Rowan, managing editor of the Lamp, a Catholic literary journal. More@thelampmagazine.com and he completes the first husband wife combo to appear on the show as guests for different programs. Nick, thank you and congratulations.
- [163:09]
Nick Rowan
Thank you. Thank you for having me.
- [163:10]
Scott Bertram
Appreciate you being here for this. A lot of fun, a lot of good knowledge. Jeff We've got an exclusive content coming up very quickly for our Patreon supporters for the month of July and well, theme to be determined. So stick around to find out excitement. Jeff's over on X at Esoteric cd. I'm there at Scott Bertram. If you want to hear those exclusive content content shows, join us on Patreon patreon.com Politicalbeats for entry level, mid level or the upper level gets those exclusive content shows, find it there. Patreon.com politicalbeats subscribe to the feed for new episodes and find us two@nationalreview.com or on Facebook. You can join the conversation on X. Politicalbeats this has been a presentation of National Review. This is Political Beats.
- [164:58]
Sleater-Kinney (Band)
Sam.