What do you want me to blog?
A few months ago, I wrote a 10 Essential list for the magazine titled "10 Essential Alternate-Universe Hit Singles." While I'm super-confident in the songs I picked, I do feel a bit silly because the whole impetus for that list was accidentally left off of it.
I'm talking about one of my favorite songs of all time: "What Do You Want Me To Say?" by the Dismemberment Plan.
For those unfamiliar with the band, they were a post-punk quartet out of Washington, D.C., who, for a time, were the biggest thing in the indie underground (ca. 1999-2002 or so). They were signed to and dropped from Interscope Records without ever releasing a full-length; the record they made on Interscope's dime, Emergency & I, they were able to take from the label at no cost and release on indie label DeSoto Records. I only got to see the band once: It was around April 2002, I believe; the band had just finished their "Death And Dismemberment" co-headlining tour with Death Cab For Cutie, and played a one-off, free show at a coffee shop about a half-hour from where I went to college. I was actually only familiar with their latest (and final) album at the time, Change, but I'd always heard good things about their live show, so a bunch of us piled into my 1991 maroon Plymouth Sundance and headed to the gig.
The coffee shop in question had no stage, so the band -- who were accustomed to drawing 1000+ people on any given night of the tour they just finished -- set up their gear on the carpeted floor in front of a few tables and maybe 150 people, and tore into their set like there was no tomorrow. My friend Greg, who was a big D Plan fan already and knew Emergency & I like the back of his hand, would nudge me every time they played a song off of it, so I knew what I was missing. When they played "What Do You Want Me To Say?" I remember just being completely floored at the absolute power of this song, and yet it contained an ever-present pop hook throughout the whole thing. After the show ended (with singer/guitarist Travis Morrison dry-humping a particularly unenthused patron who had previously pulled up a chair and sat directly in front of the band), I immediately went out and tracked down this album, and was amazed at how well the song translated both live and recorded.
How Interscope didn't hear "What Do You Want Me To Say?" and immediately rush it out to radio is beyond me, because this song legitimately could have been huge. Maybe it's rap-metal's fault. Either way, click the "play" button below and discover your new favorite song by your new favorite band.
I'm talking about one of my favorite songs of all time: "What Do You Want Me To Say?" by the Dismemberment Plan.
For those unfamiliar with the band, they were a post-punk quartet out of Washington, D.C., who, for a time, were the biggest thing in the indie underground (ca. 1999-2002 or so). They were signed to and dropped from Interscope Records without ever releasing a full-length; the record they made on Interscope's dime, Emergency & I, they were able to take from the label at no cost and release on indie label DeSoto Records. I only got to see the band once: It was around April 2002, I believe; the band had just finished their "Death And Dismemberment" co-headlining tour with Death Cab For Cutie, and played a one-off, free show at a coffee shop about a half-hour from where I went to college. I was actually only familiar with their latest (and final) album at the time, Change, but I'd always heard good things about their live show, so a bunch of us piled into my 1991 maroon Plymouth Sundance and headed to the gig.The coffee shop in question had no stage, so the band -- who were accustomed to drawing 1000+ people on any given night of the tour they just finished -- set up their gear on the carpeted floor in front of a few tables and maybe 150 people, and tore into their set like there was no tomorrow. My friend Greg, who was a big D Plan fan already and knew Emergency & I like the back of his hand, would nudge me every time they played a song off of it, so I knew what I was missing. When they played "What Do You Want Me To Say?" I remember just being completely floored at the absolute power of this song, and yet it contained an ever-present pop hook throughout the whole thing. After the show ended (with singer/guitarist Travis Morrison dry-humping a particularly unenthused patron who had previously pulled up a chair and sat directly in front of the band), I immediately went out and tracked down this album, and was amazed at how well the song translated both live and recorded.
How Interscope didn't hear "What Do You Want Me To Say?" and immediately rush it out to radio is beyond me, because this song legitimately could have been huge. Maybe it's rap-metal's fault. Either way, click the "play" button below and discover your new favorite song by your new favorite band.
posted by Scott Heisel at
12:19 AM
1 Comments:
Well I wouldn't say that was my new favorite song by any stretch, but it was pretty good. I remember hearing about the Dismemberment Plan back in the day, but I never managed to buy any of their CDs. Of course, if I had a nickel for every CD I wanted to buy back in the late 90s/early 00s and didn't, I could probably afford to buy at least a couple of them. Well, thanks to my Zune Pass, I'm finally catching up on all the great music I missed back then.
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