If I hadn’t taken a job at my local call center I would have never heard the song we are going to talk about. I was fortunate to share workspace with a fellow musician who shared great music with me.
I remember my music comrade asking me: hey do you wanna party like it’s 1997?
I say: what are you talking about man?
He says: do you wanna hear a sweet tune bro?
I say: always, hit me.
That night he sends me 1997 (Tonight We’re Gonna Party Like It’s…) by the Sleepytime Gorilla Museum.
Sometimes you get to a plateau and you think you have heard everything. Then you hear something completely original and it crushes your mind. Sleepytime Gorilla Museum (SGM) broke me. The band opened a lot of doors for me musically.
I moved away from the group to listen to other music. Because the doors got opened for me, there was so much more to listen to. I only started listening to them later in life. As a result, I never got a chance to talk much about my experience with the group or this song. This is a great song to check out. Let’s party like it’s 1997!
Sleepytime Gorilla Museum – 1997 [Tonight We’re Gonna Party Like It’s]
1997 (Tonight We’re Gonna Party Like It’s…) is full of weird rhythms dissonant chords, strange percussion, unusual vocals, crushing bass, and a huge opening riff. It was a unique sound they had. I dug the song immediately. I listened to it over and over.
This song is from their debut album Grand Opening and Closing in 2001. They would go on to do two more albums before dissolving in 2011.
The 2000s was a great era for experimentation in metal. Bands got heavier, more artistic and way more progressive than it had been in the ’90s. SGM sounded like they gobbled up all kinds of music, spat it out, put it together ass-backwards, and then burnt it with a blowtorch.
Art School Drop Out
At the time I had no frame of reference for SGM. To me, it sounded like Marilyn Manson’s Holy Wood album went back to university and got in touch with their artsy-fartsy side. It also gave me an impression of the campy horror from White Zombie Astro-Creep: 2000. SGM sounded like neither those bands. It was my previous musical experience trying to rationalize what I was listening to.
At that time I began to understand what avant-garde was. I didn’t completely understand what I was hearing, but I liked it a lot. I would later go on to study dadaism, surrealism, and post-modern situationist art in university. Even after studying the art form, I still didn’t get it.
When it comes to metal avant-garde you don’t need to get it to appreciate it. You can dig the music without knowing what it is. If it excites you, then that’s a win for the artist.
The Infinities of Metal
SGM opened a lot of doors for me when it came to understanding what metal could be. Shortly after I heard 1997 (Tonight We’re Gonna Party Like It’s…) I heard the band The Dillinger Escape Plan’s Calculating Infinity. As far as metal knew, everything was in its purview. Metal could be and do anything it wanted.
I thought The Dillinger Escape Plan (DEP) was beyond the comprehension of regular metal listeners. It seemed like you had to be a math genius to come up with those riffs. That’s also why we called it math metal at the time. It seemed like you had to calculate infinity to perform this brand of metal.
Irregular Metal
DEP had very little sense of regular song form in their music, and that was the best part. Nothing about them was conventional. They used blasting tempi and rhythm changes that defied regular songwriting. The vocals were so aggressive it was like they were going to come out the speakers and strangle you.
DEP was like seeing someone skateboard wearing roller blades while carrying an umbrella and a watermelon with a pack of orange poodles following the border.
No one knew what to think when they first heard Calculating Infinity. Check it out for yourself. What do you think?
Coincidence of Infinity
When I look at music history I always look at the dates. I like to see the time frame in which bands release albums and had their careers. It reveals the life of a music group.
Both SGM and DEP’s historic timelines reveal a coincidence.
DEP formed as a band in 1997 and released their debut album Calculating Infinity in 1999.
SGM formed as a band in 1999 and released their debut album Grand Opening and Closing in 2001.
Both took roughly 2 years to establish themselves before releasing a major debut album.
Both bands released their sophomore albums in 2004. Miss Machine came out in the summer of 2004 by DEP and SGM’s Of Natural History was out in the fall of 2004.
The coincidence continues with their third albums. Both bands released their third albums three years later in 2007. This time In Glorious Times by SGM came out in the spring of 2007 while The DEP’s Ire Works came out in the fall.
What can we say about this coincidence? It took roughly 2 years before the bands made a full-length debut. Once established as a commercial group both bands worked under a 3-year album cycle. DEP would go on to release 3 more albums every 3 years after Ire Works.
What an interesting pattern we found among the confusion of experimental metal. What does it all mean? We will calculate that soon enough. For now, enjoy the music!
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