Emily and I have a lot of overlap in our music tastes. While I have more of a tendency to roam into the heavier music, and I seem to have a greater affinity for ska and reggae than she does, we both enjoy much of the same things. One of the bands that we both love is a band called Screaming Females.
Screaming Females is a great band name, but a bit of a misnomer. While the band is indeed fronted by a female, the other two people in the band are dudes. Also, there’s no screaming; at least not very much.
The frontwoman, Marissa Paternoster is a highly adept guitar player. In fact, Spin magazine ranked her as one of the top 100 guitar players of all time. Not only can she shred on the guitar and melt your face off, but her singing voice is deep, guttural, vibrato drenched, and wonderfully unique.
All this from a 5 foot woman who always seems to be wearing a black dress like some kind of catholic school girl.
Screaming Females were set to play the Kilby Court venue in Salt Lake City on October 3, 2018, a venue that I had never been to.
I’ve always been a fan of showing up early enough to see the opening bands. For one, I want to get my money’s worth out of a show, and the more live music I can get in my life the better. It’s also a great way to learn about new music. The price of admission was 14 dollars, which is way too little for a touring band, especially one of this caliber.
When we showed up to the venue, we were told the venue only accepted cash (we only had a debit card), and that we couldn’t park in front of the venue, meaning we’d have to go find some other parking lot.
Off we went to go try and find a place to get cash (which ended up being a gas station) and then to find a parking lot near the venue that wouldn’t tow us.
As we approached the venue for the second time, this time on foot, we saw 5 foot Marissa Paternoster brushing her teeth outside the venue. Then she walked past us, apparently going somewhere, and I said “hi!” in passing, and she responded with “hi”, which is a highly valid response.
The venue itself is a room with tin walls and no heating/cooling, almost like a big storage unit. There were bales of hay strategically placed to create some separation between band and audience, and the walls were adorned with graffiti.
Because of the delay, we missed most of the first band’s set, but got there in time to see the last song, and made our way to the back of the crowd gathered around the stage. After the set finished, people began dispersing to wait outside while the next band set up, but we beelined our way to the front (as is customary).
The next band to play was a band I’d never heard of, called Kitten Forever, which was an all-female trio. As I watched them set up, what was immediately striking was that they didn’t have a microphone, instead they just had a telephone receiver hooked up to an amplifier.
After 20 minutes or so, they were assuming their positions to start into their first song, the drummer got up, moved to the “microphone”, the girl holding the microphone moved to the bass, and the bassist moved to the drum kit. It was just a weird way they set up their equipment, I figured.
They started into their first song, which was a wonderfully loud, obnoxious racquet that I was immediately a fan of. After the song finished, they did yet another round robin switch, the girl playing bass moved to the drums, drums to microphone, microphone to bass.
I had never seen anything like this before. Switching instruments after every song? This is brilliant.
Furthermore, it wasn’t until about 3 or 4 songs in that I realized there’s no guitar. It was basically just a really fuzzed out bass and drums, accentuated by a girl yelling into a telephone receiver.
Emily’s take on it was that the performance was entertaining but she didn’t feel the need to seek out their music. I on the other hand, have had them on rotation since.
This was a memorable, unexpected event, one that I suspect I’ll always remember, and it’s a good demonstration why I like to see the opening bands. It’s like buying a book with no cover, then realizing that you stumbled upon literary greatness that not a whole lot of people know about. Music to me is just fun and exhilarating. Some people skydive - I go to rock shows.
Pictured in the bottom left is one of the chicks from Kitten Forever, and the rest of the people are the Screaming Females setting up their gear for their set.
Screaming Females rocked as usual, and I’m happy anytime I can watch Marissa play guitar up close and personal. It’s funny how they always seem so disheveled when they first start playing, as if they had just stumbled out of a van (which probably isn’t too off the mark). After a couple of songs they seem to shake off the cobwebs, and eventually turns into an unstoppable, runaway train.
After the Screaming Females finished their set, we were two more bodies crowding the merch booth, which was a little enclosure next to the music venue, where I got a Screaming Females record (I almost have them all), and Emily got a Scream Females t-shirt. Then I went over to the Kitten Forever booth and looked at their stuff. There was a booklet looking thing, and I stupidly asked “what’s that?”. I could tell she was surprised at my question, and said “it’s a ‘zine”. I should have known this, as ‘zines are, or at least used to be, very important in punk rock and other underground music.
‘Zines, is short for ‘magazine’, and are homemade publications, sometimes put out by bands, sometimes put out by fans. This is one way you would find out about bands you hadn’t heard of, before the internet at least. They could also have articles about various topics, social commentary, or music reviews. This particular ‘zine had lyrics and pictures. I decided to buy a copy to help support them, as I know they need all the help they can get to put gas in their van and food in their stomachs. 14 dollar tickets is insane.
The End. Now listen to this song by Screaming Females: