HYLI Vol. LXXVIII - System of a Down and The Wallflowers
Did you buy CDs? Are you old as shit? We bought CDs and are old as shit. These are the first two CDs that we bought.
Hello and welcome to Hope You Like It. Football season is back. Who gives a shit about that crap? Andy, that’s who (Andy: I do). This little dork gets so horned up for the pigskin game (Andy: It’s true). I simply Like It but acknowledge, like a grown adult, that it’s much more boring compared to Hoops, the best sport. My fifth anniversary is also next week, so this weekend for the holiday, my wife and I are going to Charleston, SC withOUT our baby (thank u 2 her mom). It’s gonna be sick. I’m gonna go see movies and eat good food and maybe, god willing, get drunk on overpriced cocktails (Andy: I will be going to the state of Utah to watch my football team play college football, the real best sport). Let’s fucking go. We are so back.
System of a Down - System of a Down
Andy: I'm not sure how much I've elaborated on my music-listening history in this newsletter, but I basically had no musical guidance growing up. My parents never really listened to music in the car or in the house, save for a "Best Of" album from both Foreigner and the Beach Boys (Patrick: i’ve heard this countless times from you and it’s never less surprising). We never really listened to the radio either. I clearly recall getting into a friend's car, and his mom asking, "Which radio station do you listen to?" I responded with, "I don't know; we don't," and she looked at me like I was an alien. I blazed my own path musically, which is probably why I listen to one-man black metal bands that never tour. I can't relate to people having fun on Taylor Swift's "Era's Tour" because I literally have no basis for comparison (Patrick: you cannot relate to people having fun full-stop).
The first album I ever bought was System of a Down's self-titled album. In 6th or 7th grade, my school took us on a trip to Washington, D.C., and for some reason, we had about two hours to kill in a mall. We were in a FYE or something and I wanted a CD instead of borrowing stuff from my friends. I knew System of a Down’s name and thought the album art looked cool. Wanting to be cool myself, I bought it with "my own money" to listen to on my portable CD player during the bus ride home. It was during that 12-hour bus ride home that I learned a lot about what I wanted out of music. First, Serj taught me that lyrics don't matter in the slightest; 90% of the lyrics on this album are nonsense. Second, it confirmed that I love screaming. It made all other singing seem dumb. It sounds like Serj is literally eating the microphone on half of his screams (Patrick: it’s so cool when he does that shit, man). Third, if you're going to sing, I want it to have some uniqueness. I don’t think anyone would say he is a bad singer (Patrick: well…) but he isn’t your traditional guy either (Patrick: yes, points given). He also makes weird-ass noises on like half the songs. He whispers and whispering is cool. Finally, this went hard and I’d forever love things that go hard. A fundamental point in my DNA.
I immediately bought Toxicity after the trip, and System became my favorite band from then on. My friend and I got Mezmerize/Hypnotize on release day, immediately ripped it to our iPods, and we listened to it in study hall while passing notes about it. They were also my first real concert, if you don't count the time my mom took us to see *NSYNC — which I do.
I know Patrick has heard this album before. He and I did a quick System discography listen a few years ago when we had an active Group Text Record Club. But to answer the prompt, I really have only one response. Hope You Like It.
Patrick: I get to bond with Andy this week instead of trying to beat his ass through the written word because he gave me some dumb shit. That’s so cool. I do not have the same “this was my first CD” thing here, but a song on this album was on one of the first handful of CDs I remember my stepdad playing constantly on long road trips (Andy: Pat’s dad likes better bands than Pat).
“Spiders” isn’t the big single here (we’ll get to that) but it was one of the two singles off the album. More importantly, it was on the soundtrack to the motion picture Scream 3, which is the CD my Dad played basically on repeat on a drive from Chicago to Denver when I was 10 lol. Neve Campbell, eternal shoutout to you. Let’s take a look at the rest of the soundtrack: we got a Creed song, a remix of “Wait and Bleed” by Slipknot, “Sunburn” by Fuel, and some other peak late-90s buttrock. Let’s fucking go. I know Andy is with me when I say “buttrock can be good.” It can. System of a Down isn’t quite buttrock but it isn’t, like, miles away from it lol (Andy: yes it is my guy get real). “Spiders” is such a sick track, probably my favorite off this album and maybe my favorite by the band. Personally, the darker thinking-man’s nu-metal stuff they did early on is wayyyy better than the middle-period Super Political Rock stuff and the late-period Radio Rock stuff where the guitarist who has a bad singing voice kinda took over. Serj can be a little freak sometimes but he shows on “Spiders” that he could have been one of the GOAT … idk, “kinda gothy alternative rock???” singers if he just committed to that lane. Respect for wanting to do something bigger than that and shoutout for having conviction or whatever and crafting Wikipedia page summaries for your lyrics and all that but this kind of stuff is much more effective to me.
The front half of this record is so fucking good. “Suite-Pee,” “Sugar” and “Soil” fucking rip. The bridge of “Suite-Pee” might be the best thing the band ever laid to tape. “Know” and “Suggestions” are also solid, but more like B-tier compared to the S-tier aforementioned tracks. Unfortunately, the back half of the record kinda nosedives in quality. With the exception of “CUBErt,” there isn’t really anything else memorable going on there (Andy: Mind is one of their best tracks imo). For this reason, I’d say Toxicity is probably the better album, but the first handful of songs on this record are my favorites that the band ever dropped. Sicko shit. I love it.
The Wallflowers - Bringing Down The Horse
Patrick: Bob Dylan wrote my second favorite album of all time but I was a fan of his son first. I was living in the Northeastern suburbs of Chicago Illinois and playing football and collecting Pokemon cards and this mf Jakob dropped Bringing Down the Horse and wrecked my 7-year-old life. I had collected the “money” that I “earned” from “mowing the lawn,” which I’m pretty sure my dad had to go back and re-mow after I finished, and took my hard-earned wages to the local Best Buy to purchase a compact disc. You remember buying CDs from Best Buy? They used to keep them in those security cases that they had to unlock at checkout. I’m pretty sure those things are more secure than Fort Knox. If you kept Hillary’s emails behind one of those things, not even Russia would be able to interfere.
Recently, the Bible published a review of this album as a Sunday Review. Not to get all Pitchfork Discourse-y but the score annoyed me in a way that I thought was long behind me (Andy: P4K doesn’t know metal so who cares). Nothing is more corny than when people get mad at some indie-rock band that has gotten a glowing review in the past and gets a simply Fine review for their latest shit. But my little band that made the first CD I bought gets a Shrug Emoji Review and I filled my little diaper. As a concept, it seems like Sunday Reviews are usually reserved for albums that either a) are culturally important and should be on the site in some form or b) having some sort of anniversary. Bringing Down the Horse fits into neither one of these, so it seemed weird to drag it out just to kind of soft-pan it. The gist of the review seemed to be “it’s fine but kinda is a one-hit wonder for a reason” and that bummed me out because almost every track on this album could have been a hit and like four of them legitimately were lol. Maybe it would be more fair to think of this band as a one-album wonder.
“Sixth Avenue Heartache.” God dammit. What a track! This was the first song I heard by the band and the reason I took my $20 or whatever to the Vernon Hills Best Buy. Part of the review kinda dragged this song for having the backing vocals done by Adam Duritz of Counting Crows fame. Get a grip! Come on!! The lead slide guitar lick is basically the platonic ideal of a riff: something that you can hum the melody to just as well as any vocal hook on the album. “The Difference” is probably my favorite song here. The perfect kind of power-pop americana type thing that we used to make in this country. That chorus just fucking goes. Jakob isn’t quite the lyricist that his dad is, but neither is anyone else really in recorded music, but guess what? Bob doesn’t have a hook like the one in “Laughing Out Loud” which makes me want to rip my heart out of my goddamn chest. “I Wish I Felt Nothing,” same, brother (Andy: same).
Overall, I kinda get why people might rag on this band. Dude was maybe dealt the easiest hand ever dealt to anyone as a Nepo Baby of maybe arguably the most culturally significant American musician and never really delivered a Great Record after the one that put him on the map. If Bob Dylan released The Times They Are a-Changin’ and then a bunch of stuff that’s kinda Just Fine after that, would Jakob have even had a career? I get it, but man, that doesn’t take away from this album having like eight or nine massive Perfect Songs in a row and then a great closer. This album rips. In a vacuum, it deserves all the respect in the world. I’m glad I bought this CD and I’m glad I bought every other CD I bought after it except for some of the pop-punk ones. Shoutout Jakob. I Hope You Like It.
Andy: Patrick already used up his once-a-year-Bob-Dylan listen, so he decided to go with the other Dylan. I thought this album was called Bringing Down the House until I started prepping this week's newsletter (Patrick: common mistake, we know you cannot read). I can't read! Did you know this band had a song on the '98 Godzilla soundtrack (Patrick: yes, a Bowie cover, real recognize real)? Good for them!
This seems to rock? I really didn't enjoy "One Headlight" because I'm sure I've heard it 10,000 times in various bars, on the radio, or on CW shows (Patrick: man the CW did not exist when this song came out lol but I get your drift). Also, it fades out, which is just the weakest, most cowardly move you can make to end a song (Patrick: come on). "The Difference," by my definition, goes hard. The song is fun. Honestly, no real shade to Jakob Dylan because he seems pretty good at what he does, but these songs are at their best when he's quiet and just kind of rocking out. This just seems like a nice, friendly, good old-fashioned rock 'n' roll album (Patrick: yep!)! They're not going to destroy a hotel room, but they will get you bobbing your head a bit. It's like rock 'n' roll your grandma can enjoy, and I mean that in the nicest way. Truly, it's not an insult.
I do wish Jakob had a more unique voice. He feels significantly more put together than his dad, who either sounds super goofy or like he has gravel in his mouth. I’m not educated enough but for some reason this entire album made me think if Jimmy Buffet wore a leather jacket and played rock ‘n’ roll instead of Hawaiian shirts and played…whatever you call Jimmy Buffet music (Patrick: shoutout to my father the number one Parrothead).
I was really not stoked about listening to this the past week because there has been so much good metal/hardcore lately but I didn’t really need to worry! Decent album! I enjoyed this an appropriate amount!