Transcript
Speaker: Hello and welcome to the Kill Power Hour, a podcast where three friends spend the better part of an hour arguing and explaining why the holy war between atheists and agnostics has yet to claim a single life.
Speaker: Each week we go through one item on our top 10 list. We're currently on albums and this week we'll be discussing Tucker's favorite album of all time. 1982's How Could Hell Be Any Worse by, you guessed it, with Bad Religion. No way! I'm your host, Eric, and as always, I'm joined by my best friend, Tucker.
Speaker: I am him. And my best friend's little brother. Yeah, that's me. More like dad religion. Yeah, at this point. Savvy old men listening to him.
Speaker: Well, least they're still be pumping out punk rock, even though Greg's doing his port sort of cold as the clay. Country. That shit was like straight country. That's my favorite kind of country. It's like folky.
Speaker: Is that next season? Are we just going to go through everything Bad Religion has touched? Yeah, all like five. Major releases, side projects. yep This episode is about a 79 Ford Torino that Jay Bentley drove for four months 1982. We're all going have to take Professor Greg Graffin's course in evolutionary biology at Cornell and then leave our reviews. For real. That would be pretty cool. Wasn't Jay mechanic? Pass.
Speaker: I think he was like a motorcycle mechanic, which is hilarious. Like on the side. i i Are we bad religion? I'm the professor. Tyler's the mechanic. oh ah well Who is the the marketing director? heroin addict. no shit.
Speaker: I knew that was going to be me. Well, I mean, I guess Brett did a lot of marketing when he started Epitaph. Oh, yeah. i mean, he was like the business guy. I'll be that guy. Weird Tony. Because he's past the heroin phase.
Speaker: Yours is yet to come. Yeah, exactly. It's going to hit you at some point. Damn it. You're just going to wake up one day and be like, I really want to score some heroin. I really need to. And then Google how to do it. I don't even know how to do it. tucker Tucker's going to be looking up Strung Out for one of the podcasts, and he's going to come across this heroin article. He's like, what is this?
Speaker: I couldn't even watch Requiem for a Dream. or like a train spotting because drug scenes were too heavy for me. yeah yeah I emotionally crumble inside.
Speaker: I walked into a party once in Minneapolis like 20 some years ago and into this party and then you go through this like secret door and there was like this other room and it had this like opium den sort of vibe and this dude had a fucking needle hanging out of his arm and I was like, oh God, I just got so freaked out. I actually left the party.
Speaker: I left everyone there. was like, this is too fucked up for me. Just say no kids. Yeah. o Not fun. Well, apparently that was a huge problem in Los Angeles in the early eighty s Oh, heroin. Yeah.
Speaker: Well, it's making a comeback. Is it really? Well, I feel like just fentanyl. Yeah. Heroin too. But yeah nobody goes and, nobody goes and like, give me fentanyl.
Speaker: Yeah. You just accidentally stumble across it. Yeah. Yeah. yeah Yeah. yeah Much like bad religion. Yeah. No, you don't accidentally stumble across this masterpiece.
Speaker: ah this ah So this is their first album. This is their first album, their second recording, but their first album. Well, it's a bunch of recordings, right? Well, so there's some, you could scour the internet and I'm sure if someone older and punkier than us would have like a very clear vision of this. But this is their first album that was then, it had gone out of print and then in 1994,
Speaker: One was reissued as 8085 on CD. So, mean, that's like peak CD period, right? And then they had lumped in, um back to the known and another had a religion.
Speaker: Yep. The bad religion EP and the back to the known EP. And they had lumped that onto the back past service. Yep. So all of a sudden the album went from 14 songs to 28 songs. Yeah, or 29 minutes to 55 minutes.
Speaker: And then when they remastered it. I reviewed the 29 minute version. Okay. Well, I had to double check that for myself because after listening to this shit for fucking 30 years, I'm like, what's real anymore, you know? So the first time you heard this, did you actually own the original record or you just bought 8085? Yeah. Okay. 8085. as a stupid kid in a prepubescent internet, I thought that the album was 28 songs long. Yeah. And because it had...
Speaker: like I think the song bad religion is actually on that album of three times. Yeah. So if you, I mean, you just, we just listened to a black flag album, but if you listen to like black flags, everything went black compilation, which also came out in 91, they have uh,
Speaker: damaged And Damage 2. They've got like three different singers on one album in some cases. And it's like three versions of it. So it, you know. yeah And this this is a great segue too because this is like a hardcore album.
Speaker: this is This is their only hardcore album. but this is um This is back when bands at their threshold of whatever becoming a band, you only released 7 inches.
Speaker: I can't even fathom releasing a full length album. album like ah they're only on vinyl you know two you get some money together you press fucking 500 records or something or these guys have obviously pressed a lot more because they were actually successful um and but yeah and and and then they got to the point where it congealed enough where they were popular and they're like we have all this pre-recorded material yeah someone was smart enough to push it all together into one fucking double album in the case of Everything With Black Everything With Black was a double album right?
Speaker: Yeah, that thing was like 60 songs and they were, of course, they're 45 seconds long. but So speaking about pressing, so when I lived in Long Beach, I had a favorite record store, which now I can't remember the name of it.
Speaker: um And I stumbled across, you know, because when we were kids, it was just tapes and CDs. Tucker held up a vinyl copy of this record. Is that even opened? Still sealed? It's not the original one.
Speaker: It is the original one, but i have like I'm so disconnected from my own shit that I'm like, oh man, I haven't listened to it in a while. so I flipped it over. I'm like, oh yeah, this is just...
Speaker: just the 14 songs, side A and side AA. Nice. And then I'm like, oh, this is the OG epitaph e and the OG epitaph address.
Speaker: And then I opened it up and I'm like, oh, this shit smells fucking as old as I am. and then i And then on the actual vi vinyl, this is the coolest thing because I'm not a vinyl nerd.
Speaker: I don't have a lot.
Speaker: These were hand etched in the inside here with all these different like whatever, I guess, serial numbers or batch numbers. Yeah.
Speaker: An old man writes it after he individually carves each. No, it's Tucker. You get to choose what's written when you press the record. Yeah. it's on It's on the stamp. Yeah. Yeah. no Like all the but all the Black Flag ones said... I mean, it might have been hand etched into the original wax that the metal mother is then made off of but it's a stamp. There's no variance between that record and every other one that was pressed. Okay.
Speaker: If it was repressed, they'd probably read... Well, this is an OG one. All the numbers. What does it say? Does it say anything cool in there? says, where the hell is Racine? That's great. That's awesome. Because that's where Greg's from.
Speaker: Yeah. One of the Black Flag ones says, like, do the creepy crawl or some shit. That's super cool. yeah Nice. Yeah. The dead wax inscriptions are one of my favorite aspects of it's the it's one of the OG Easter eggs. I don't know. Can you tell this might be more for Tyler, but can you stop touching the record, Tucker?
Speaker: The original E? Yeah, no, that looks that looks like the real thing. Tucker just got done eating cheesy pizza and is rubbing his fingers all into the grooves of this record. That's probably worth $1,000 or something. If you log on to Discogs right now, you can watch the value drop as he touches it even more. Yeah, let's see. Wow.
Speaker: The high for this is $50. Really? For the original one? Wow. They only press $1,000 of these, right? $10,000 is what they sold in a year. Whoa. whoa 10,000 copies.
Speaker: Okay. Pretty good for, i mean, these guys. That's a ballsy first pressing. Yeah, right? ah How long have they been playing around before they put this out?
Speaker: Well, they'd been playing since the late 70s. okay. All right. And I mean, they took they took their time. It says originally only 6,000 were pressed. But then within a year, they reached 12,000 copies. So they must have done. Putting out 6,000 still, that's like they had to be pretty confident of their audience.
Speaker: When they had to borrow $1,000 from Brett Gerwitz's dad to make this fucking album. Yeah. They were 16 something, 16 or 17 or something. Oh, yeah. So young. That's insane.
Speaker: That's insane. Imagine being that young and recording these songs and then also having your shit together to put out the album. Yeah. Dude, like Brett had already like part of that breakup too was like he's in rehab in 1984. That him at like 19, 20 years Yeah. Okay.
Speaker: nineteen twenty years old yeah okay Like these dudes were like, from from Greg's book that Tyler and i recently read, like putting together some of this timeframe, like the lineage there, like,
Speaker: He paints a picture that is like Los Angeles punk scene is fucking dark. Crazy town. Yeah. Dirty, extremely violent, completely nihilistic, like is basically eating and itself and spitting itself out, which is essentially a big part of why punk kind of died for a while because it couldn't even sustain itself.
Speaker: Yeah, it's weird. ah I mean, this album sounds like a classic punk album to me. i didn't really think of it. There were a couple songs that sounded like hardcore, but it really made me think more of like late 70s punk.
Speaker: really Yeah, to me, it's not hardcore at all. It's hardcore in how terrible it sounds. Even headphones. This could not be... even this couldn't this could not be If this was any different, it would be worse. It would be weird, yeah.
Speaker: But I'm saying from ah ah from a standpoint of an average listener, production-wise, it sounds awful. But it fits it exactly perfect. But I think that production standard puts it in the category of like hardcore, which then I don't know.
Speaker: Yeah. Well, and you look at how like sloppy some of the, some of the instruments are at the time. Well, yeah. These fuckers literally learn how to play their instruments and on on this album. That's why of the original album sounds pretty.
Speaker: like way better because when they started doing those other EPs and it felt like the studio production was higher, you could actually hear the fidelity of their shitty playing more.
Speaker: Yes. And it, it drew my attention to that. But the first 14 songs are recorded with a tape machine. you know it couldn't be done like a voice recorder in a storage unit.
Speaker: The only thing I do wish is that the hi-hats were lower and like they were so loud. Like there's such a washy sound of hi-hats the whole fucking time. But yeah that's that's the sound of that album and it sounds, it is what it is. I mean, I think this album sounds so much like an early Black Flag album.
Speaker: Yeah. Like take the acoustic or the vocals out. Just like... I don't... Yeah. Just, yeah, it sounds like that. feels like... Aesthetically similar.
Speaker: Yeah, aesthetically similar, I would say. All right. yeah You want to jump into this? Well, I'll try to cruise too because I feel like we've kind of... I'd rather leave room for talking about all the side streets of all of this and how it all... um I mean, before I get into track listings, this whole album... No, this whole album is about like...
Speaker: broken families and the working class in Reaganomics and the arrogance of man and the destruction of the environment. like you were They might have been young, but like these themes have held true through 40 years of their career. and yeah That's pretty impressive that they've been able to speak to it in new ways.
Speaker: It's still relevant and they have refined themselves along the way too. They didn't just come out barking the same shit. Yeah, I haven't listened to any other later stuff really since I graduated high school. I don't think I've listened to any of the newer stuff. or I mean, there was a lull in awesomeness. There was a lull. They picked it back up. I feel like their original output was... The songs were vague and universal enough that they resonate today just as much as they did when they originally put them out. Oh, totally. Yeah.
Speaker: I think that's, yeah, that's always good. The beauty of it. I mean, what's more fucking universally true than we're only going to die. Yeah. Yeah. First song on the track or on the album. We're only going to die. ah We're only going to die from our own arrogance. Oh, did you guys see Tucker? Did you buy those masks?
Speaker: What mask? When COVID hit. Oh, they released. Oh, that's hilarious. Bad religion masks that said we're only going to die from our own arrogance. And it had the bad religion symbol on the mask. So hilarious.
Speaker: So great. And you can take that in so many different. I love I actually I think the vagueness and I think I remember reading this like a Greg Graffin did a fucking alternative press fucking article.
Speaker: hmm. It was like, i I purposely leave a lot of things vague. I i say things sarcastically, question mark. They could be sarcastically. They could not be sarcastic. You take it your own way. You think about this. you That's your job to fucking ponder yeah where you go with my statements.
Speaker: like I think he puts a lot of onus on the individual to figure out their shit. And I think that even he started doing that, with you know, obviously he was like a scholar, but then he becomes a teacher. And I think that idea of like, I'm going to put this thing out here for you and I need you to figure it out.
Speaker: I think that started way before this guy was BA in, BS in, a master's in, you know, a doctorate in. It's kind of cool. Like you could see, you know, cause we are all who we are and like, we just do a little winding of like how we develop or up and down. doesn't have as, well, it's funny about this and maybe this, I don't know if you guys feel the same way.
Speaker: When I was, when I was younger, i thought grownups had their shit together. And then when I became a grownup, I realized no one has their shit together. my fact grownups are worse than children because they have no fucking direction or morals or yeah yeah no but somebody watching over them, forcing to do what they want or do what they need to do. Being an adult.
Speaker: Yeah, man. you know And this guy is a shit show too. Everybody in the band is a shit show. Like he's got real fucking problems. He like has fucking failed marriage. Like it's fucking obviously good records, bad records.
Speaker: Also, I don't know anybody that's made a constant awesome records their entire life. So I'm not going to like fault them on that. But like you add these accolades of all of his achievements, you know, of academic, academic, whatever.
Speaker: He's still a fucking person. And Yeah. I mean, i I'm fascinated that he teaches evolutionary biology and yet he thinks about how humans are just going to fucking ruin everything anyways.
Speaker: Is that his class? Because his PhD is in zoology. Yeah. But he teaches evolutionary biology. Yeah. I think he did, yeah. That's fucking cool, man. Yeah, I mean, he's the evolution of a species and yet he has this...
Speaker: kind of negative outlook for the human species. But this is something that I feel like has given me a ah emotional open space on things in life is that it can be contradictory and we should be able to be like fucking this is fucked up. This is wrong. oh wait a minute.
Speaker: Let's think about this. Wait a minute. No, this other side is right. And just be in the gray zone of eternity open to different ideas to try to figure out what the fuck is wrong and right like sound like a flip-flopper remember when flip-flopping was like the worst thing you could call another politician oh my god miss those days i miss those days did you guys hear that or watch that um senate do uh finance committee jujitsu no yeah Yeah, with ah with that one dude trying to battle the guy from Sean from UAW or not UAW, but from the the union.
Speaker: No. Oh, my God. A fucking senator got out of his seat and tried to was going to fight the president of the union.
Speaker: And Bernie Sanders is like, sit down, sit down. We're not going to be here talking about physical violence. It's worth the time. But anyway, ah I feel like that fits right in line with this album. Latchkey kids, you know, this came out the 80s. Like, that 80s was the latchkey generation, you know? does ah What does that mean? It's a kid who, like, comes home. Comes home to no parents because both parents are working. Still working, yeah. Yeah. um its I guess I did that sometimes. I would come home and, yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, no, that was parents that was the deal. I think Latchkey Kids are one of my favorites on the on the album. Part three. Latchkey Kids actually is my inspired track. Is it? right Yeah. Oh, shit. Because supposedly in an interview, ah Greg talks about stealing a riff from this album for Latchkey Kids. So we're going to listen to ah Utopia's Rape of the Young. Hey.
Speaker: Won't you have pity, won't you have pity on the guiltless one? Say, Mr. Chrysler Won't you think about it, won't you think about it, judgment day has begun Won't we become, tomorrow's human?
Speaker: We'll do the death while tomorrow's human We don't mind, you just keep on taking, keep on taking, till there's nothing at all Sit on your hands, it don't say nothing, cover your eyes, you won't see nothing Cry for the innocent, sit to the wall Don't tell the soul, man
Speaker: Hey, Mr. General, can't you find something, can't you find something that's a do for a buck? Hey, Mr. President, nobody listens, nobody listens, so we run out of luck. Nobody cares for our poor troubles, watching you care is too much trouble.
Speaker: You got yours, so just don't fuck you, just don't fuck you, cause you won't be around. Sit on your hands and don't say nothing, cover your eyes, you
Speaker: ah That was a Rape of the Young by Utopia, which is Todd Rundgren, essentially, off of the Oops Wrong Planet. is Oops All Marys.
Speaker: Anyways, I found that connection to be fascinating. And then to find out that you guys said Todd Rundgren produced one of Bad Religions. like New America. yes Yeah, yeah. Full circle, man.
Speaker: love that shit. You could totally hear, I mean, the riff, obviously, but then also like the tempo and the guitar-driven aspect of it. As Tyler said, it was yeah, it's punk music, man.
Speaker: I could totally see where If their production was different, you wouldn't think twice that it it was... punk music it was fast it had all the fucking weird shit um yeah I like that song anyways part three part three this was written by Jay Bentley did he write a lot of songs no okay did not In fact, he just did two on this album, and I don't know that he got a lot of credit on a lot of songs on even different albums.
Speaker: And he's the bassist, correct? Yeah. Yep. And he basically left for a while and then came back with Suffer. He left only... no jay quit when the band broke up. So he was part of that, but he was always with the band.
Speaker: Oh, okay. Yeah, they never had to... Remember, right? They never had to replace Jay. Yeah. Yeah, there's some wishy-washy shit between this stuff and Suffer. Or was it No Control?
Speaker: don't remember. Suffer was the first one. Yeah, so, but whatever. I mean, i once Suffer was happening, the rest of it was all um J. Yeah, then they had Brian Baker in, and then they'd go through some drummers, but, yeah. Well, it was a pretty clear anti-war song.
Speaker: Part three? yep Yeah. Yeah, I mean that. They have a song in the expanded version of this, which came from whatever EP that was, which was World War III. But I'm like, part three is World War III is what he's getting at. i Seriously.
Speaker: Yeah. um Faith in God, that's his like teenage critique of the what what weak people need. That was the first one I was like, I was like i didn't have to read who wrote the lyrics. I was like, yeah this is Greg. yeah yeah But what I love about group Greg is like further songs, like he talks about like basically dabbling in faith, which is Sure.
Speaker: I think that's something that people should talk about. like Even like atheists should talk about like, no, if you're a fucking atheist and one day you're like fucking so broke down that you feel like there's a you know what mean? Like, yeah.
Speaker: Yeah. but Fucking disbelieve your beliefs. it's That's what should be everything. Like, question everything. I don't be a conspiracy theorist, but like... Sounds like you're just a quitter.
Speaker: Yeah. Have you guys heard about Q? Yeah. my god Well, so Faith in God is like... Oh, sorry. You keep going. No, no, not at all. This was my ah my Inspired by track, but if you if you have more to say... Oh, and I want to be inspired.
Speaker: I'll get to who, what band this relates to us, me from, but it's articles of... Wait, what was that? No, no, no, no. So there's a story on how I found this band.
Speaker: It's Articles of Face, Bad Attitude, yeah and it's fucking great.
Speaker: I
Speaker: I just think it keeps in your place You know that it's not what you're doing It must be such fun outweigh You need some more, it's not great!
Speaker: Bad attitude's what I've been told since was just five years and goodbye with David's soul, right in my place. Bad attitude's result for just enough like someone else, another soul who needs a help. Oh, to hell. no, it's not my good It must be such fun, I believe. Who needs more?
Speaker: Oh, my God. That was Articles of Faith, Bad Attitudes. um So I listened to of favorite bands, 88 Fingers Louie. And they had a song called My Father's Dreams that i loved.
Speaker: And somehow or another, i was in somebody's house and they were doing lots of coke. Like lots of coke unrelated to the story. And ah they were listening to this. They had a seven inch. And I'm like, this is a fucking 80 Fingers Louie song. And he's like, fuck you. Fuck 80 Fingers Louie.
Speaker: This is Articles of Faith. And I'm like, whew. it Like fucking everything aligned in my head. And I immediately ah got the CDs and I fucking loved it. It's fucking great.
Speaker: You did the work. It's really important when you think you know something as a teenager and you're like, hey, this is that song. And then someone's like, fuck you. Yes. This is a cover song by the original shit. Yeah. Do your fucking homework.
Speaker: This is... This is like the succession of music. Like you could, ah that needs to happen more often. And so actually one thing I enjoy about my teenage years, I like yeah with Tucker's friends and everybody, like there'd be like a new band and like you, you would play it, but you wouldn't want to tell people who they were. Cause it was like your shit. I feel like yeah it was like guarded, which was hilarious. Yeah. But these like nuggets of like fantastic music. Now it's like all free and nobody's,
Speaker: and you know, enthralled about it. No, like i want to, I want to get together people and like, have them play like the best song of this band and be like, Oh, you want to know who this is? You're like, give me $10. Cause that would hype me up about this shit. You know, like I want to go somewhere and be like blown away with fucking music. I think that's about when people go and hang out still now, maybe there's more than more than ever.
Speaker: And they put a record on, like an actual record. And then they hand somebody this huge thing that's whatever, 11 by 11. And then they cruise through it. And like you don't take that time if you're just swiping.
Speaker: ah I will say on our camping trips, the few that I have been on, one of my favorite aspects is people would usually have like a playlist or true something like that. And you get to hear that. And I would learn pretty much an entire year's worth of new bands just in that session. And sometimes you need to hear the best song of a band, the most approachable song, I should say, yes yes in order to like be okay with it.
Speaker: Right. Would you say what is the most approachable song on this album?
Speaker: To me, it's the first two. Really? Yeah. I mean, maybe in the Night. I don't know. I like that song. ah But yeah, the rest all just kind of seem more like generic hardcore.
Speaker: Well, so I want to say real quick. So you were just talking about faith in God. So faith in God fuck Armageddon and pity are essentially like the trifecta of religion songs in there.
Speaker: I mean, fuck Armageddon, this is hell is also, I think talking about the low life and the fucking destitution that he's seeing in Los Angeles at the time. But they're all like really riddled with like, you know,
Speaker: uh people out there tell me that say i'm no good because i don't believe in things that i should that's fuck armageddon like okay so he doesn't believe in religion pity is i show pity on the human race on the ignorant plenty who devote their lives to an icon i'm just like dude this sounds like the same shit that i was writing yeah in my own journals as a 16 year old only this guy figured out how to turn it into Do you still have your 16-year-old journals? i have every single journal i've ever written, ever.
Speaker: And when's the last time you went back and read your 16-year-old journal? couple years ago. Okay. oo ah When are you going to show Evzin? What a sorry sap I was.
Speaker: Just feeling sorry for myself around the clock. just I don't know why these girls don't like me. Day 403 where e c beat me up again. You see Drew blood on me this week.
Speaker: Wow. I don't know when I could show that. I know like the perfect time. Like i I can see it in Milo's eyes. Whoa. He's 12 years old and I can see. Do you have journals? Not quite journals, just abstracts abstract thoughts of fucking madness.
Speaker: i am but yeah Half of them are soaked with beer. The other ones are soaked with tears and blood. other ones are bloody cum. Yeah. Oh my god. No. This isn't a journal. This is just your dirty underwear. Ew. It's a bunch of t-shirts stuck together.
Speaker: god. but there's a book. There's going a point where he's going to be like you don't understand. I'm to like, fuck you. Let me show you. Let's read these books. You need to have a basement below your basement where you take him to show him all this stuff and it's just- Force him to dig a hole. yeah No, you've recreated one of our child, your child bedrooms in the basement below your basement.
Speaker: I make a paper mache version of myself. All right, well, so we'll skip pity completely. Well, you said that's the end of the... That's the end of the trifecta at the guard the God song. And then In the Night... That's my favorite song.
Speaker: That's my favorite song. buts Oh, my God. Tyler said that's your your bike around with a bag full of bottles. Skateboard with a backpack full of beers. I'm skateboarding to ah random people's apartments. Just taking my future piss babies for a ride. Albany, Georgia, just slamming beers on my skateboard and throwing them in fucking alleyways and that whatever. That makes That makes a lot of sense.
Speaker: Well, so yeah, this closes outside A and I think it's got like a fun, yeah, like a miscreant sort of devious that's not dark like this other shit. I mean, I guess maybe it does dark. dark as The beginning of it sounds so good.
Speaker: I think maybe this is actually a heroine song. So I take back everything that I'm doing.
Speaker: are
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Speaker: are are i down
Speaker: are
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Speaker: But it's alright, cause never heard of um And to feel
Speaker: time with are
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Speaker: a our own like but committed our side are and
Speaker: I was in the night. i Okay, there's obviously a lot of albums and a lot of songs, but like they gave like 15 seconds almost, 12 seconds to instrumental end.
Speaker: I feel like they don't necessarily do that a lot. They'll have trailing oohs and ahs or trailing graphing vocals, but this was just straight instrumental end. I feel like Bad Religion has done Solos that were around 10 seconds at the end. they're But they're normally the solo. And I actually just think this is one of the great things about Bad Religion is typically their solos have a melody similar to the singing. Yes. Which makes you think about that, like without thinking about it.
Speaker: which is a happy place to be when you're a listener. When you, no, no, for real. Like when there's a background, like solo, or there's like a guitar melody that is the same as the way it's being sung.
Speaker: Because then when you're listening to it for the first time, you already know what the solo is and you feel good about it. Yes. These are fucking tricks, man. These are tricks. <unk> on my you Damn to be free First song on side AA Good song now It doesn't really stick out to me This one seems to be more like a societal Dying is just your destiny Yeah like society's weighing in on me Like just that stuff's not gonna happen I think that was the other song that actually had a little bit of piano on it though too He did do piano on one song I can't remember Well we're only gonna die has piano on it Like the first song
Speaker: on side Yes. Like has piano. And I think there's a, during the breakdown in Damn to Be Free, I'm almost positive there's another lingering piano.
Speaker: I don't know I appreciate that. Yeah. It's ballsy. It's different. They're sending themselves little apart from the regular hardcore West Coast, California. Oh, yeah. like I would agree with that. ah White Trash, Second Generation.
Speaker: um yeah just keeping the keeping the same themes. Classic hardcore song. It's easy to sing. The kids remember that one. Yeah. American Dream, this is... You might... ah
Speaker: you might assume that he's talking about a parody of the American dream or the failed American dream. I don't know. I mean, he's a, again too, like how much did you as, as teenagers think that you guys knew and figured it all out? Like this is, this song to me is the, is a teenager talking like he's some weathered and withered adult. And I'm like, yeah, yeah because you've just been broken up with for the first time.
Speaker: Yeah. You know, you're just going through these huge emotions for the first time. And yeah and then, yeah, it feels like a fucking revelation. Yeah. And that's exactly, i kind of love that about them because I'm pretty sure if I read my journal from like 15, 16, I'm going to feel just as confident. Well, like the revelation is like a sub for wisdom.
Speaker: Yes. Like it's just so blindingly clear. Right. That you're having this particular thought. Yeah. Yeah. It's like when you open up the Victoria's Secret catalog and you're like, these boobs. Oh, yeah. That's a clear thought.
Speaker: We dug quite a few of those out of the fucking dumpster at the Circle Pines post office. we it that That's the fucking talk you need to have with Epson.
Speaker: When he comes of age, you're like, all right. You're a jerk off to a JBS. When we wanted... when we wanted pre-internet when we wanted to see titties, we had to break into the post office.
Speaker: Dumpster. Dumpster, yeah. Oh my God. You can leave out the dumpster part. It makes no, they need to know all the terrible details of how just fucking ridiculous we were. yeah Everything.
Speaker: The lines from American dream though, is ah the first line is I hate my family. I hate my school, you know, like, yeah, yeah that I don't know. It has my favorite like teenage lyrics in this song.
Speaker: And, uh, hate your God. I hate my job. Yes. That's another like beautiful pairing in that. I love that. I'll have a Chevrolet with white walls on the side. That one was my, that was my favorite line from that.
Speaker: Like, ah it's like almost like a McDonald's sort of like, I'll have this and the, yeah. And the, those were the, that's suburbia when there's parallels today, man.
Speaker: With like fucking cars and boats and big TVs and, hey Fucking all the, all the things that we have, like, you know, if you went from house to house, like I think that people's life goals are similar, you know?
Speaker: Yes. It's one more s thing. Right. It's fucking white walls. Well, that's eat your dog. You're tired and bound to God's useless advice, bloated stomachs from aching diseases, hold back the fight.
Speaker: in like That is my favorite song title on this album. Eat your dog. Yeah, because he doesn't even reference it. I was so excited listening to that song about how he's going to talk about eating a dog and he doesn't get to it. I wonder if that was like a saying back then.
Speaker: A little bait switch. Yeah. ah The band Tyler and I were in had a song called Tyler Fuck Starving Dogs. Yes. Whoa. I almost accidentally said to Evzin this morning, your most famous would you rather joke.
Speaker: Because he's been would you rathering every. It's not my whole time with him now is a would you rather question. But not as fun. and i like Would you rather eat two M&Ms or a Sour Patch Kid? No, that's where we're at. like Yeah, that's what I'm saying. No, I know where that says. And he thinks said half my answers are just appalling. Like, you would take two small Twix over one huge Butterfinger?
Speaker: And it's just like, I just fucking... Anyway, but for our listeners, the ultimate would-you-rather joke... and EC is the inventor of probably hundreds of really good ones, was I think the first one you ever told me.
Speaker: And it was... Would you rather start a podcast or listen to every bad religion album ever? Holy shit, laughed my ass off for days. No, it was, would you rather walk in on your dad fucking your dog or walk in on your dog fucking your dad?
Speaker: Oh!
Speaker: And it just really matters who's getting fucked and who's getting... And... You had to hold back that one from your child?
Speaker: Right. Right as Bahar, the bus driver, rolling out. But I'm sure your version would be like, would you rather see Madge fucking me? Or... know. He doesn't know it. Would you rather see Peppa Pig fucking Bob the Builder? Whoa.
Speaker: Whoa. oh Talk about muddy puddles. Oh my God.
Speaker: Jesus Christ. What have we got next? um voice it got go Voice of God is government. Yeah. ah That's a banger. That is a good one. I feel like sermon start to that song. Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah. He did a, um he did a sermon type song, something. I'm tired tired. Do you remember what it was? It was like gone, maybe process of belief around that era where he's like, Oh, um what wasn't that a fun, something. No one cares. Like he cares. It was, wasn't a gray race or no substance. Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah, it's the end of the millennium speech. Yeah. And he cites some of these words. It's kind of cool. Like he c cites a few of these words, like part of this song. Just like the way he says, neighbors. Yeah. ah It's so great. Very good.
Speaker: Yeah, we should try to find that song. ah The next one is oligarchy. There's on no substance. Yeah. There we go. And oligarchy feels like an ode to what they were inspired by. Yeah.
Speaker: Like if you listen to more of the Articles of Faith. Oh, really? good dude this song sounds like an Articles of Faith song, music-wise. I had to look that word up.
Speaker: Yeah, I still don't know what it means. an Oligarchy? Yeah. Is that like the fucking oligarchs? The fucking well yeah but rich people that have control over everything? But they're not actually elected officials. I think that's part of it. Yeah.
Speaker: Well, their upper management is all garden, which makes them oligarchs. Wow. Wow. wow Pretty sure that's where it comes from. Senior leadership at Olive Garden Corp.
Speaker: Olive Garden. It was part of the C-suite. ah And then you've got 14, the very last song. i like the i like the kind of slow and quirky, if you will, intro.
Speaker: Weird vocal effects. Yeah. Yeah. um I like the different parts of this song because it kind of feels like it harkens back to their prog interests. Kind of.
Speaker: So, don't know. Yeah, if you slowed the whole thing down, it could be ah pop song. Maybe change the lyrics too. See them fight old man crying, deny their ruin.
Speaker: Yeah, it is a song. Well, and also, this is my own. This is a suicide song. Is it? William had 36 blew his brains out. Yeah, I'm like, now look at him.
Speaker: Chad only had one watch the mother mourn her only son. I feel like that was their time served in jail. I don't know. Salvation. anyways Concentration. Doing time.
Speaker: Like, the word doing is the word that I always fuck up and read is doing.
Speaker: you would You would read that wrong. I always read that word as doing before doing. And doing wrong. So we didn't we're not we're not reviewing the whole rest of it?
Speaker: i get The other songs? But can I say one thing before we, and then I want you to say whatever you want, Tyler. But before we just move on from this. So I don't know if you guys noticed this or not, but the last part of the last sentence of the last song,
Speaker: Wrong or right, you're losing sight. You're you're just going to die anyway. Like, going to die is like the first the name of the first song. Right. So he closed it where it ended. And damned to be free, dying is just your destiny, which is the middle point.
Speaker: I think he's like a positive nihilist. I think he's an optimistic nihilist. I don't think he's... Who calls himself a naturalist. Where do you see the optimism here? I mean, he's not a depressed guy. He's like moving on yeah he so he likes To me, it's factual.
Speaker: You don't need to be bummed out about the facts. The facts are... You're being bummed out as an emotion. You don't have to be pumped up. about the You don't need to be sad that you're going to die.
Speaker: No, fuck that. There could be a pile of shit in front of you, right? There's a pile of shit in front of you. The wind could be blowing towards you. The wind could be blowing away. One way is totally fine. There's still a pile of shit in front of you.
Speaker: The other way... That pile of shit's really fucking awful and I'm about to throw up. This is like a weird bootstraps kind of conversation. Yeah, there you go. I'm excited for season three where we talk about Tyler's top ten ways to stand in front of a pile of shit.
Speaker: I always bring fans. In episode, The Way the Wind Blows. um okay so let's know but Okay, so this is Modern Times.
Speaker: There's 35 more songs in this. there Yeah, there's double the length of this album after this album. And it's it's interesting to look at the first part as as that its own album and then immediately hear the production and songwriting change and evolve so quickly.
Speaker: There's no oohs and ahs in the first record at all. I would say. no And yes Greg is barely singing.
Speaker: He's mainly shouting the the guitar chords that he's playing. Yeah. But he's 16. sixteen I mean, I'm not, these are not like excuses. These are reasons. um He's 16.
Speaker: It's punk rock in 1980.
Speaker: Who's singing? No one's singing. This is like... Oh, no. yeah That's what I'm saying. It's just like, that's how quickly they evolved. Yeah. And we should also say, I think, between the first album and the EPs, they also put out a fucking prog rock record that they were so embarrassed. Like, Back to the Known? Well, they broke up, yeah. That came out after.
Speaker: So from track 21 to track 25, at least, they had put out another album that was fucking trippy and weird and super synth heavy.
Speaker: Do you guys bro you guys listen to any bands where the singer released side shit but then used the band's name? Oh, no. I'm not going to fucking... Okay, I'll call it out. Strung Out.
Speaker: um The singer releases his own stuff. Jason Cruz, love the guy, like his music, but he released it. if you If you look up Strung Out on Spotify, it's under Strung Out.
Speaker: None of the band's in there except for him. And I feel like he's using... but He is, which hooray for him. He's been fucking in the band forever, like whatever. But... He's promoting his own shit, you're saying? Yeah, yeah. and Oh.
Speaker: That's what Greg did. He fucking used the name Bad Religion and woefully wrong, we all fuck up. At some point, he did this shit and I don't know if he expected people to like it or maybe he just wanted. Oh, because it was mostly him on that album, right? Yeah, I guess so.
Speaker: Yeah. that ah and He wrote it and just got them to do it. Also, if you, your first band. It's the Chili's two of albums. Oh. How, you see, your the very first band, the very first group of people that you made songs with.
Speaker: Yeah. Could you imagine you, have like, staying the course and still being in that band for the next 40 years? No, that's insane.
Speaker: So I could totally see why Greg was like, oh, this was that shitty like punk rock band. And now I've cleaned it up. I've come up with this music that's popular. That's like a genre that's real.
Speaker: And he fucking does that. And it just turns out that nobody fucking likes it. You know? Nobody liked it. It's still good. I like it. I love it. The titular song.
Speaker: well Do you know other bands that have a song named after the band?
Speaker: Pennywise. Yep. Strung out. Really? Okay. couldn't think of any. Polly. Okay, all punk rock bands. I think.
Speaker: um Right? Michael Jackson. There's no song called Michael. He writes a song about himself. No, I agree. But with a bad religion, it's like something. It's not like they're fucking...
Speaker: Yeah. Well, the so the recording that's on the Bad Religion EP and then hearing the Back to the Known version, to me, that's the biggest difference in their evolution. I was like, whoa, okay.
Speaker: They have clearly, like, not completely rewritten the songs, but they got to the fucking point and like understood the best parts of the song and just amplified it.
Speaker: Yeah. and ah I thought fucking drastic to actions. I don't really I really like that song, but i just don't want to listen to it anymore. Yeah, yeah. burned out on Fuck. Frogger, though. Dude.
Speaker: Oh, my God. That sound effect is hilarious. Well, so since that's the dog's barking. Well, dude, so since that's the bonus, we're doing another we're doing. That's my other favorite song and it's because you like it so much and EC likes Frogger and I found a record, there's a recording of it then playing it live back then.
Speaker: So yeah, that was Frogger off of the ah Back to the Known EP that's jammed in the back end of this. But we watched a live version. The live version was good. Really good. Which was good. Dude, Greg Hudson. He's great. I fucking love that guy. That dude's great.
Speaker: And then along the way was my other super favorite. And it's... got this like weird tempo and yeah really leans into Greg's like voice. Like they're firmly done with the screaming. Like, yeah like you said, you see like they know which part of this is working the most.
Speaker: Absolutely. Or maybe they didn't and they just fucking pushed through it. True. It's fun to think about how these decisions were made, you know? I feel like New Leaf also had the oohs and aahs.
Speaker: like that These are the songs I can play in front of mass people, like people that don't know, people that don't like punk music, yeah and they're just fucking good. yeah They're not like upsetting.
Speaker: They're like just great music, and a of times people are like, who is this? They're like, I think I've heard this before. You haven't. It's just like, yeah maybe the chords are just fucking right, and the melodies are just similar enough to something. Yeah.
Speaker: I don't know. Yeah. I mean, there's a reason bands make it so long, right? they're They're doing something right on such a chord level. They're not like, they're not tricking people into like, there's like, they're delivering on some. so Yeah. Something.
Speaker: Have you guys heard about Q? All right. Oh my gosh.
Speaker: Bad Religion is part of the Illuminati, dude. They're taking over. It's kind of funny that I feel like both you and your brother have had compilation albums as some of your favorite albums, which to me is getting pretty close to the realm of soundtrack.
Speaker: ah I agree with you. um At least I didn't pick a single as my album um or fucking... name is a melody. i just I just whistle. Here's a recycling bin called... Wow.
Speaker: yeah Well, those are formative albums, man. I mean, I feel like that is That's a raw part of either you or what you think you want to be, but you're not good enough to do it. Yeah.
Speaker: I'm interested that this album is your favorite album of all time because I feel like they really... I agree. They have... This is super interesting as a time capsule, right?
Speaker: Well... When you compare it to the rest of their output, I feel like you could legitimately point to other albums that are just... for the most part better well so you know you're you're right it and you know so generator was what number something for me four yeah chisel was three so generator is probably my actual favorite like when it comes to the music itself but got you know the thing that we didn't talk about we actually spent the whole time talking about the album the music the genre the generation the right like
Speaker: But we didn't really talk about um like the me part of it you know Right. How you first found it. Well, and I don't even remember how I first found it. Like I like i said in a previous podcast, like we worked our way back from Generator. Right.
Speaker: So like new albums are coming out, and then we're we trying to find them and afford them. Yeah. from behind. But when I first heard what was 80, 85, but as how could help be any worse, that was probably at the peak of my teenage anger. Right.
Speaker: And we had like, it was probably like one season or two seasons into us living in that, um, townhome. And so Tyler got a bedroom. but the pizza My mom and stepdad got a ah ah bedroom, but then I got the unfinished basement. So it's just start stud walls looking into and outside, cement floor, no carpet, and it's freezing down there.
Speaker: And then directly across from me, which there's no door, is the door to the garage and then the the laundry room. You need to talk about how you first heard this record while you were in kid jail. Jesus, mostly.
Speaker: So but where I'm going with this, like when it was when we did when it was finally enclosed and furnished, um ah this was like just the thing I could just kind of scream and move to like energy-wise to get that like,
Speaker: like just really kind of harboring a lot of negative energy back then. And I remember just going downstairs and turn this thing on super high and kudos to mom and Doug for not telling me to turn it the fuck down all the time. Cause I'm sure they were getting sandwiched from below and above.
Speaker: Oh, it's BC boys upstairs and fucking this was downstairs. No, this is so this. Can we shout out to kudos? The fucking granola bars. That we would have been eating back then. Oh, I loved those things.
Speaker: so tatter what were you say only our friends had kudos our mom would never buy us kudos yeah they were expensive yeah anyway no this is um we're talking about bad ah but beastie boys upstairs bad religion downstairs Oh, no, the rawness of this shit. So when when we were in Court Street, so this was 89, 90, we got a tape that head fucking Technotronic on one side, Black Flag, and some other shit on the other side.
Speaker: And I remember being so embarrassed because Black Flag was so far. We lived a suburban life. It was all either no music, it was TV, maybe some like quiet Fleetwood Mac.
Speaker: And all of a sudden you hear something as raw and crazy as fucking black flag, like fucking spray paint the walls. This is mind, this is, someone is, I've never experienced. This is the equivalent of doing mushrooms as like a seven year old. Yeah, man, like this never, I've never seen a human being in distress in my entire life.
Speaker: Right. And all of a sudden I can hear it and it's put to sort of a melody sectioned up into something that you might call a song. And then there's another one afterwards, like in, it kind of makes sense. Like it's such a fucking mind blowing experience.
Speaker: And i I specifically, we had this little tiny red tape player stereo. Yeah. And it had the tape in there. I remember putting it on the lowest. So it'd go from zero, no sound, just to the where it started making sound. And i remember putting up to my ear because i was so embarrassed to let my parents, I was embarrassed to let people hear it. I didn't know what it was about.
Speaker: But I do remember the feeling when I first heard it. I was like, Holy shit. Dude, I can. Something's up with this. I can tell you what we're on that, that either the first tape or the first tapes that had the check your head on it.
Speaker: It was, yeah I think it came from Lyle. Yep. We had Operation Ivy on it. Which would have been brand new back then. Like brand fucking new. So we had Operation Ivy.
Speaker: i yeah Operation Ivy. ah Primus. Sand and Seas of Cheese. We had ah Red Hot Chili Peppers, Blood Sugar Sex Magic.
Speaker: Some of those songs. And then we also had My War. Black Flag My War. and What was the, there was a fifth one, I think.
Speaker: But this is like this, matt this is this mixtape that was the stepping stone for everything for Tyler and I just to like, oh yeah. And then, yeah, I said, check your head.
Speaker: It was almost better that we didn't know because it made it such a big deal when I first heard it I almost feel like I might be doing a disservice to my children by listening, let them listening to all these great musical fucking accomplishments like Danzig, Bad Religion. They're making their lives too easy. Yeah, like letting them watch great... I mean, they they haven't watched Coburn yet, but...
Speaker: If you don't tell them to watch that shit, the only stuff they're going to see is AI generated. Yeah. Like they're not going to see anything that's actually made by a human being. so That's super scary.
Speaker: Anyways, ah good job on the second season. Way to go kill power another year Knock it out of the park, look at us We now know each other's Top 10 favorite movies As well as our top 10 favorite albums So I can guess All of your passwords Shit Maybe Tyler wants to talk about the concept For season 3 That agreed on last weekend oh we Oh we didn't do listening to We absolutely did not agree to anything We definitely have a contract And a writer that states that Cool Alright
Speaker: Yeah, what did we listen to this week? Oh, ah one band I was listening to that I also read had inspired Mad Religion was The Jam. don't know you guys have listened to them much. No.
Speaker: British band, but dude, the the album that has That's Entertainment, it's something like Sound Effects, I think is the name of the album. yeah It's so good.
Speaker: and And I can hear a little bit of Bad Religion it. But specifically, listen to the song, That's Entertainment. That's Entertainment. OK. So good. What about you ah Land of Talk, Bell and Sebastian, and then just some dance tracks.
Speaker: October has officially started. So City Girls came out an album. just sounds like a quintessential fall. Oh, yeah, yeah. They just described, yeah. City Girls, yeah.
Speaker: They came out as an album, and there's a couple bangers on it, but not so much. And I'm trying to, like... As a fan of City Girls, I'm trying to accept this, but someone did them dirty and like that did not.
Speaker: Yeah, it's not great. Just trying to cram your limp dick in that hole. Oh, God.
Speaker: The album is called Raw, but yeah. so yeah It's like an apt description. Sketchy. Oh, one thing I've been listening to on repeat that's super fun. um And if you are a fan of Atlanta rap, that era of really fucking amazing shit, um there is a group.
Speaker: i don't They only put out one album, and it was fucking amazing. It's called Dungeon Family. And Dungeon Family was Andre 3000. ah it was The Future. it was CeeLo.
Speaker: It was Sleepy Brown. It was Big Boy, you know, also from OutKast. um Killer Mike's on there. I mean, these, everyone's just, Killer Mike would have been fucking like 20, I feel like.
Speaker: ah Corrupt is on there. Janelle Monae. I mean, like, this goes so far back because this album came out 2001. um in two thousand and one Okay, cool.
Speaker: We'll check out. I guess Janelle's not on that album, but um people like Big Rube are on there and Cujo Goody, Timo, Witch Doctor, Slim Calhoun. Tucker, continue to read Wikipedia articles out loud.
Speaker: About rap. No, I'm kidding. He just Googled That was the first thing that came up. No, no, we have we got good shit. We also have a, not that new anyone's listening, we have a Christmas special coming. Season two Christmas special.
Speaker: Straight from a fucking sauna. Yeah. Oh, I booked my tickets. 20th to the 28th. Do you want to listen to three grown older men sweat in a sauna?
Speaker: Naked. Naked sweat. Oh. um Talking about their favorite Christmas songs. If you do, listen to this next one.
Speaker: I sold it as good as I can. So there we go. You'll never hear a podcast recorded with men harder than this. Whoa. Is that the, that's the commercial for season.
Speaker: Do you like your podcast hard as hell?
Speaker: so should My bottle say yes. Compared to this podcast because my earbuds would drain their battery completely. It was so hard.
Speaker: Okay. all right. Next time, to everybody. What are we doing? What? When? Are we introing next season? Oh yeah, not yet. Okay, cool. But what was that brilliant idea though that we drove home? It was two out of three.
Speaker: Here's a list list. Oh, yeah, that's what it is. I would say we need to stick to the top 10 format, though, and so make your list 10 things. Yeah. But, okay. We're still recording a podcast. But it's going to three-episode season.
Speaker: Probably. I love this. Now we're getting wean territory. Yes. This is like we need to... Oh, you expect this one thing from us? Let us make sure that. This is our bad religion second album.
Speaker: All right. All right. Well, until then, join us next whenever as we continue to talk about weird shit. Bye-bye. Later. Whoa.
