The Screaming Females story begins with sweaty, ask-a-punk gigs in New Brunswick, New Jersey, at such dank, quasi-legal basements as Meat Town USA. As the tale goes, drummer Jarrett Dougherty suffered from tendonitis during the band's infancy, which barred him from drumming for weeks on end. While recovering he spent much time with Michael Azerrad's seminal survey of 1980s indie rock in America, Our Band Could Be Your Life, presumably getting stuck on the ethos, humility, and hybrid rock stylings of the Minutemen.
Quite fittingly, the band recorded its 2006 debut on a shoestring budget in Dougherty's attic. They booked hundreds of shows themselves. In time, the college student who ran the local punk label Don Giovanni threatened suicide if the band didn't sign on for 2009's Power Move, so they did. They were plucked up by the Dead Weather and toted around the States on tour. They were written about by a teenager for Rolling Stone. Years later, they recorded their nuanced fifth disc, an opus of sorts, with Steve Albini, and called it Ugly.
If any Screaming Females record has suggested they may someday become a group worthy of cataloging in a book like Azerrad's, Ugly is it, igniting a classic punk sound with a friction that falls somewhere between SST and PJ Harvey's Rid of Me. The band's sound has always been characterized by frontwoman Marissa Paternoster's fiery howl and brutal guitar work, the latter of which has garnered her "Best Guitar Shredder" distinctions that never feel hyperbolic. Ugly puts a newfound emphasis on songcraft and sustained momentum. Paternoster has always been an astounding guitarist and performer, equal parts J Mascis and Carrie Brownstein; her songwriting is finally entering the ring.
Given the backstory, it's almost comical that the record begins with the title "It All Means Nothing". Much of the discourse surrounding the Females has centered on Paternoster's spectacle: She shreds, she is very short, and she is also female. But here, she equates her self-worth to "a broken hand" and makes it clear that she can't buy what people are selling her. There is a fun, anti-commercial sentiment that comes with her dismissal of a commodity for sale, and the song's opening line-- "You take what's mine, and face me like you're blind/ It all means nothing"-- diminishes the relevance of a visual element.
Of her sonic trademarks, one of Paternoster's most distinct characteristics is her vocal vibrato, which conveys a sense of liberation that is intrinsic to the band; like a maximum-throttled Corin Tucker, little is restrained, and she occasionally dips into a hardcore screech. The chorus of "Rotten Apple" finds Paternoster painting words with a broad palette, hitting the many corners of her register over a pointed guitar crunch. Loud, animated shrieks come often at the end of the band's songs-- like the unhinged bellow that helps close out "Red Hand" (and that's after three minutes of Paternoster sounding like she could maybe murder someone). The color red is a noticeable motif throughout Ugly, from the "red ribbon" and "red blood" on "Slow Birth", to "Doom 84", a heavy seven-minute piece that's true to its name, where Paternoster is "blinking red fury." This emphasizes the passion, rage, and aggression on Ugly, qualities that make rock music such a powerful language of freedom, particularly for women.
Ugly is the most varied Screaming Females record, as evidenced on tracks like "Leave It All Up to Me", which is full of vaguely psychedelic fretboard mystics. Album closer "It's Nice" is a real change-up, a proper Screaming Females ballad, with Paternoster's vocals showcased over orchestral strings, as she sings, presumably, about not selling out ("If I'm bought and sold, then I'm cruising in on a dead end street"). Hell hath no fury like Paternoster on "High", where she is at her most anxious and intimidating. One of the most frightening moments of the album comes with her roar at the end and its ensuing patch of chaos; it's also one of the many points seemingly designed for a live show.
Visceral lyrics abound elsewhere on Ugly, and Paternoster specializes in violent, abstract musings. She offers plenty of references to death and an undefined "family curse," and all over, there are images of blood and bones, a clenched gun or noose, a burning altar or sun. The earth shakes. The sea recedes. At a point, there is a sour taste in Paternoster's mouth.
But Paternoster also gets quite literal about the radical qualities of what she is doing-- a testament to her growing capabilities as a lyricist. On "Something Ugly" she is on the phone with her mother, afraid to die alone; on "Crow's Nest", she's trapped in a self-constructed "prison," analyzing her own scars. She burns, throughout, with an earnest desire to quench and feed her own wants and needs. Paternoster is perpetually contemplating her own satisfaction, pleading for help, and presenting clear-headed ideas about defiance, all the while exerting her knack for creating suspense on a song and then, with her band, leaving it entirely obliterated.
One of the record's most surprising moments comes on the otherwise unmemorable "Help Me". Paternoster admits she'll "learn your letters" and "rewrite all the books," after which, she declares, "you've been warned." Screaming Females are a group with a classic rock sound who are expanding our idea of what a rock band can be. They could help redefine it if Paternoster remains true to her word.
