Why is there such a taboo for many contemporary music listeners when it comes to screaming or yelling in music? How else can an artist display a pure sense of emotion or passion in their vocals if they are not enthusiastic or animated? Raising the octaves of one’s voice to the point of a scream can be used as a tool for singers to express more deeply a theme within a song or display an emphasis of a lyric or lyrics of a song. When screaming and yelling in music goes wrong is when the screams or yells are done throughout a song with no complexity but rather, senseless exertions. No one raises their voice when speaking with someone unless they deem it necessary or at some points in time, lose control and explode with incredible emotion or frustration. That is the point of it all, to demonstrate these instances or events where such depths of emotion escape someone, for songs are orchestrated noise with vocals that are supposed to illustrate real, and identifiable events in people’s lives.
Chaos in which events seem too much to handle or overwhelming, so you and everyone else lose control; insanity that is normally felt when events or actions are taking place that truly make no sense; anger when you are pushed over the edge of calmness and into an unstable emotion that can be dangerous and spontaneous; and melancholia, where nothing you do seems to make sense, where everything appears pointless and you are simple. Chaos, insanity, anger, and melancholia are four real feelings and emotions that people have endured in their lives and are instances where screams and yells are often associated with. To better illustrate this idea, here are a few tunes that exemplify or put into song, these four feelings.
1. Chaos: “Chop Suey!” – System Of A Down
A song about the dichotomy of religion and martyrdom, and the events of September 11th, should be utter chaos. Throughout the song there are fast-paced instrumentation, and lyrics such as “I don’t think you trust/In my self-righteous suicide,” “I cry when angels deserve to die,” and “father, into your hands I commend my spirit/Why have you forsaken me,” that demonstrate the dual and completely contradicting perspectives of the tragic event. Sung very aggressively with additional screams makes “Chop Suey!” a great representation of chaos and confusion during September 11th.
2. Insanity: “Helter Skelter” – The Beatles
To me, The Beatles were the pioneers of incorporating screaming into their songs, in a proper manner. In their earlier songs, such as “Can’t Buy Me Love,” where Paul throws in a yelp after a proceeding chorus, is an example of a shout without meaning, but the developing Beatles were able to find a way to use screaming in a meaningful way. “Helter Skelter,” is a song of pure insanity that ended up inspiring the Manson murders, and is, at its core, the incessant efforts of someone trying to get something, an answer out of someone. The lyrics are sung fast and aggressively and are not entirely coherent but that adds to the craziness because a ‘helter skelter,’ is a winding slide. However, it is used here as a symbol of unyielding determination, “when I get to the bottom I go back to the top of the slide,” which, done after a long period of time, can lead to insanity. The screams of Paul McCartney of ‘again’ in the line “and I get to the bottom and I see you again,” and his yelling of “look out helter skelter,” along with Ringo Starr’s “I got blisters on my fingers” at the song’s end, makes this crazy song even more crazy with the dial turned to 11 from start to finish.
3. Anger: “Drunk Walk Home” – Mitski
With the name like, “Drunk Walk Home,” you know it is going to have some emotional punch, emphasis on the punch. The premise of the song, in what is both plausible and relatable, is Mitski singing of her anger with someone (presumably a lover) who has emotionally mistreated and neglected her, even while she goes out of her way to impress with “these killer heels for you.” It is truly a song that identifies a ‘drunk walk home,’ as Mitski sings not only of her anger towards this lover of hers, but of her sporadic thought processing while drunk with lines “I will retire to the salton sea/At the age of 23,” and the final “see the dark it moves/With every breath of the breeze.” After the last line, a heavy and ire-filled guitar riff ensues along with Mitski screaming in an inconsistent manner, to truly make it not only the perfect song of a ‘drunk walk home,’ but a perfect song of screaming anger.
4. Melancholia: “Sometime Around Midnight” – The Airborne Toxic Event
Listen to this song when you are heart-broken over a past love, and I promise not only you will be hit in the feels, but you will shed some tears. It is an epic of a hypothetical (but all too real) scenario-addressed in the second person to put you in his shoes-where you sit at a bar with your friends, and the girl you have been missing and lonesome without enters the bar wearing a dress you know all too well. The song progresses with the old flame speaking to you, catching up on old times only so you can remember those beautiful moments you had spent together, thus making you feel more lost than you had been before. Later, she leaves with someone, and that is when the uncontrollable sadness enters. You too leave, drunk and miserable, to find her again, even while knowing “that she’ll break you in two.” The sorrow slowly closes in and increases with each line until it irreparably takes over your body, and it is why in the stanza starting with “then you walk,” is done while singer, Mikel Jollet, screams each verse until the closing line “you know she’ll break you in two.” It is the passion for the one you love, mixed with the beaten down loneliness that creates such a melancholia within you that makes this song a perfect use of screaming.
