“Mother” - Danzig
(Words/music: Glenn Danzig, available on Danzig, American Recordings 1988)

After firing off yesterday’s video game related post, I started trying to think about another song from a video game that I could write about today.  Naturally, my attention turned to the most blatant marriage of music and video games and thought about my introduction to the rhythm-based “fake rock star” games.  If my memory serves me correctly, a few of us were going to the casino to play cards.  It was a Saturday afternoon and we got a late start, but we were hopeful that we could go, put our names in, and eat lunch while we waited to get seated.  After about an hour and a half, we moved up one tenth of the list, so we decided to cut our losses and head back home.  That was when Mike and I decided that we would take the money we might have lost (we’re both pretty good card players and while we never really win big, we never lose big either) and invest in Guitar Hero II (this was after a long, fruitless attempt to buy the game the previous New Year’s Eve, instead settling for a Dog the Bounty Hunter marathon after midnight).  We proceeded to play from the time we got home from the casino (4 PM-ish) until nearly midnight, passing the plastic Gibson-esque guitar back and forth between songs.  We were hooked. Over the next few months, the default plan for those nights where going out somewhere was undesirable and staying home was maddening, Mike and I would get together and hone our rhythmic chops.  Soon, we were finding different ways to keep ourselves occupied with these songs.  Personally, I tried to flawlessly play Cheap Trick’s “Surrender” while practicing the guitar solo in Matthew Sweet’s “Girlfriend” behind my head (no, the fact that I looked ridiculous is not lost on me, trust me).

One of my favorite parts of the game (and the subsequent games – my little brother has Rock Band so family gatherings become group performances of these songs) was the discovery (or, in many cases, rediscovery) of new songs.  I earned a new appreciation for the Rolling Stones’ “Can’t You Hear Me Knocking” after trying to play the guitar solo a few times.  The most immediate impact of the game’s music came through Danzig’s “Mother” - it was a song I knew well enough from occasional modern rock radio plays to recognize it, but not enough to know what it was called or that it belonged to Danzig (I’ll also admit here that despite having several friends who worship them, I have a cursory knowledge of The Misfits at best.  This is probably something I should fix at some point). Early on, it became one of our favorite songs in the game as Mike and I would negotiate who would get to play it (“if you’re playing ‘Mother’ I’m playing ‘War Pigs’”).  Soon, after repeated plays, “Mother” began creeping into our everyday life.  I’d get the song, specifically the riff, stuck in my head, usually prompting some kind of reference to the song. 

We reveled in the song in part due to the game, but also because it’s the type of song that gets subconsciously embedded into your brain.  The highly rhythmic and frequently repeated main riff was complex enough to remain interesting enough not to get annoying, and Danzig’s primal wails channel that part deep down in each of us (well, me at least) that wants to nod along just a little more deliberately.  The Allmusic Guide describes Danzig’s voice as “Elvis meets Jim Morrison,” and he certainly has a strange, dark charisma to his vocals – they aren’t quite high enough to reach Iron Maiden-like heights, but they’re screamed in a way that gives those early Soundgarden tracks a run for their money.  “Mother” toes the line between self-parody and visceral rock and roll – Danzig realizes he’s fits the bill of the “heavy metal stereotype” (see his appearance on Aqua Teen Hunger Force) yet uses this to his benefit.  In the hands of one of his imitators, it would sound almost campy, but Danzig manages to “sell” the song by putting the focus on the power of his voice rather than the words being sung.  Oh, and that guitar riff is pretty cool too; I wish I knew how to play it without having to mash multi-colored buttons.

More on Danzig: Allmusic | Amazon MP3 | Emusic | Last.fm