Streaming Weasel

Search through the iPod of any pop-punk fan over 12, and you´ll see the names Screeching Weasel and Riverdales in the artists menu. Search through their closet shelves and you´ll find where many of those iTunes files came from -- rows of compact discs that have sat untouched since the digital music era began. Ben Weasel knows this, and he sees no point in contributing to the morgue of dead discs. The former Screeching Weasel/Riverdales frontman has just released a new solo album, These Ones Are Bitter. But you won´t find it in FYE or Sam Goody -- or any non-virtual store for that matter. With the exception of the limited-edition vinyl release Edmond Records has planned for later this year, These Ones Are Bitter is available only in digital format. It´s the first album on Weasel´s digital-only label, Mendota Recording Company, a project he knows will likely be a challenge given the ¨you gotta hold it to own it¨ mentality of many music fans. But without having to shoulder the cost of CD replication and having spent next-to-nothing on recording costs, Weasel´s not exactly betting the farm on it.

¨If the thing flops, I haven´t lost that much money because I didn´t put up that much money,¨ Weasel tells New Times on the phone from Madison, Wisconsin, his home for the past year. ¨If it exceeds my expectations -- which are very low -- I can feel like I was the first one on my level who did this.¨ But his level is one not easily categorized. Though Weasel had his taste of the big leagues (when the Riverdales toured with Green Day in 1995) and influenced numerous mainstream ¨punk¨ bands, he has always preferred to stay out of the spotlight. ¨I´ve always been more comfortable in an underdog role, and when that wasn´t my role, it became boring to me,¨ Weasel says, describing the Riverdales´ three-month tour with Green Day. ¨It gets to the point where it´s like punching a fucking clock.¨

For the past two decades, the Illinois-native (born Ben Foster) has been kicking up a racket both musically and as a former columnist in punk rags like MaximumRocknRoll and Hit List, as well as his own fanzine, Panic Button. (Many of those columns would later turn up in his book, Punk is a Four-Letter Word.) Screeching Weasel formed in 1986 and dissolved three years and two albums later, only to reemerge in 1991 with a new lineup and a new full-length, My Brain Hurts, an album that laid the blueprint for the generations of pop-punk bands that followed.

Rooted in the Ramones-styled minimalism and armed with an abundance of oohs, ahs, and whoh-oh-oh-ohs, to say nothing of the melodic, three-note guitar leads and catchy choruses, Screeching Weasel became one of the most emulated (read: ripped-off) punk bands of the 1990s. The band broke up again in 1994 and, with the exception of guitarist John ¨Jughead¨ Pierson, morphed into the Riverdales, a back-to-roots band that negated any semblance of ´90s pop-punk, going instead for the ¨golden era¨ Ramones sound. Two years later, Screeching Weasel came back from the dead, releasing a few more albums before disbanding for good in 2001. The Riverdales, having initially called it quits in 1997, regrouped in 2003 to release a final album, Phase Three. By then, however, Weasel had already released his first album, 2002´s Fidatevi. That album was far more personal and reflective than most of Weasel´s previous works (with the possible exception of Screeching Weasel´s Emo). On These Ones Are Bitter, though, Weasel adopted a narrative approach.

¨On the new one, I´m writing from the perspective of two characters in a relationship that´s breaking up,¨ he says. ¨Some songs were written from the male perspective, some from female perspective, and one that´s both. I wanted to do something that was not as -- I wouldn´t say the last album was a confessional, but it was personal. I wanted to get away from that.¨

Despite the ostensibly dour subject matter, the songwriting on These Ones is a lot brighter and poppier than on Fidatevi. All the essential pop-punk elements are here -- the vocal hooks, three-note guitar leads, oohs and ahs -- and this time around, there´s more of each packed into every song. For example, the opening track, ¨Let Freedom Ring,¨ starts off in familiar Weasel mode, beginning at full steam with a terse, catchy guitar lead followed by the introductory ¨welcome back¨ verse. Before the song´s halfway mark, however, it gives way to a Fastbacks-styled instrumental breakdown (sans over-the-top guitar solos) before changing to a higher key and resuming the main hook, creating a crescendo on top of a crescendo -- something Weasel employs throughout the album.