Screaming Females have returned to A.V. Club’s Undercover sessions this month for the second time playing Taylor Swift’s “Shake It Off.”
The catchy tune has been covered by quite a few artists since its release this past year, but it’s always interesting when an independent punk rock band chooses to cover something as out of their element as an upbeat, pop song.
When A.V. Club asked lead singer Marissa Paternoster why the trio decided to cover Swift’s tune on their list of songs to choose from, Paternoster replied, “Because everyone in the world likes this song.”
Screaming Females are known for their crisp, solid sound. For this cover, posted this week on A.V. Club’s website, they mixed their clean rock with the up tempo beat of Swift’s platinum track. With Paternoster’s undeniably unique vocals pushing the performance, the song kept it’s original shape, but there was a taste all its own added when the band twisted its sound.
Paternoster’s only objection to the song was the “rap” part.
As for Paternoster’s review of the song, she said, “I’m ok with it.”
Every year since 2010, A.V. Club has been inviting artists to their studios to pick songs from their list for their Undercover sessions. The last time Screaming Females were in their studios for Undercover, they performed a cover of Sheryl Crow’s “If It Makes You Happy” even though the song wasn’t on A.P. Club’s list.
The last time they visited A.V. Club was back in 2012. This year, however, has marked the release of their sixth album, Rose Mountain, released February 24. The video for their single “Hopeless” was released in February. Following the album release, the band set out on their spring tour. The tour, touching down in North America and Europe, spanned from February this year to mid-May.
Screaming Females have been known as a self-producing group since their inception in 2005, which is why their new album is so unique. With the help of Steve Albini engineering their past albums, the band has been making headway with their music but for this latest album, instead of self-producing, the group decided to change things up a bit and work with Matt Bayles as a producer.
The band is made up of Paternoster as lead singer and lead guitarist, bassist Michael Abbate and Jarrett Dougherty on the drums.
The trio are set to start their next tour July 17 in their home state of New Jersey with The Bouncing Souls and Andrew Jackson Jihad. The tour will span all the way until their last stop in Philadelphia on August 29.
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