Since dropping , the Screaming Underground EP has been downloaded over 10,000 times. Listening to the album this weekend, it’s easy to understand why: the emotions explored in this 6-track EP are universal; anyone who has ever felt a little nuts, a little horny or a little fed up will find a advocate in these songs.
Screaming Underground is the 4th album from singer/songwriter/producer Charlie Demos. Compared to his other albums, the first one released in 2004, Screaming Underground is leaps and bounds riskier, edgier, and angrier. In his eponymous debut, Charlie sang about love and finding that special person. In his last album, Anatomy I, he explored gender and sexuality and began his journey into the electroclash sound that has fuller expression on this new EP. Inspired by artists like Peaches and Trent Rexnor, Charlie carves out a new sound; at times as ghoulish and as dark as Mr Reznor ever wanted to be, but with a slight dance inflection and as musical as a trained vocalist ought to be.
For Charlie, the EP is both and expression and a confirmation of the horror of the human experience and specifically his own experience as an artist; what we think and feel and know are not always pretty and palatable. Charlie would like us to shut the fuck up and get sexy and angry in the dark with him.
FUCK ME/FUCK U
The EP begins with a scathing indictment of the entertainment industry machine. Blisteringly short, we are brought into the soundscape of Screaming Underground with a punch to the face.
Underground
The first single off this EP, Underground explores the grey and murky regions of the psyche; the lines between love, lust and madness. In this piece, the monster is the hero- in acknowledging the terrifying truth of his emotions, he is the righteous one, saved by his bravery in facing the ugliness inside us all.
Masterbate
In Masterbate, Charlie takes on intellectual dishonesty and creative stagnancy. He rejects the mediocrity he sees in other artists that may achieve more commercial success by playing to the industry; in this song it’s tantamount to whoredom.
Half Alive
In Half Alive, Charlie again visits the bottom of the emotional well, rifling through the unpleasant thoughts we all have in those dark lonely moments. His skillful vibrato, features here at the end of the song in a skittering, manic rap- like the middle of a panic attack, when thoughts are racing through the mind at top speed.
Nocturnal Emission
Singing as if from the bottom of a watery grave, Charlie comes to a final embrace with the dark sensuality and half-madness that flows through the EP. Seducing us down into the dark like a ghoulish siren, he asks us to “let go… and open wide”. We must come explore the beautiful inner world, “much more [beautiful] than outside.” Despite the pain of this self-discovery, it is the ugly truth that must be embraced.
GET WET
The EP finishes with Get Wet, an open invite to play, now that the raw and real truth of the self has been revealed. The feeling here is not love, but it’s just as powerful. A free acknowledgement of the often less-altruistic motivations that drive us, GET WET wants us all to cut loose, live it up and dive in.
All six of the Screaming Underground tracks are available for download for FREE at http://charliedemos.com/ Follow him on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/pages/Charlie-Demos/116480445975?ref=ts&v=wall
Jenn Nolte is an Honorary Member of The Queenz Of Media
- Jenn Nolte is a librarian and armchair music critic. She owns lots of books and all of Charlie’s albums. She’s a Virgo and lives in New Haven, Connecticut.
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Tags: Charlie Demos, Fuck Me Fuck you, Jenn Nolte, Nocturnal Emissions, Screaming Underground, The Queenz Of Media
Update: Screaming Underground as been downloaded 16,000 times as of this writing- up 6,000 since the article was first written!
Also,apologies for the typos in paragraph 1! Now I know why ppl hire proofreaders. Sorry all! ~ Jenn