Screeching Weasel - Weasel Mania (2005)

Although a slew of other bands found greater mass exposure via MTV or the Warped Tour, make no mistake, Screeching Weasel was as important to the 90's punk boom as any band. If one needs proof, this is a great place to start. These 34 tracks cover nine albums, two non-album song compilations, and an EP, along with another compilation track. More importantly, they show a band that shined through simplicity. "Weasel Mania", a clever take on The Ramones' best-of title, crams 34 songs onto one disc, each tune hand picked by Ben Foster himself. This release is essential for both new listeners and longtime fans in search of an one disc with lots of longtime favorites.

Ben Weasel's eulogy to his own band is – of course – built equally of cynical jibes, bruised geek entitlement, and a little bit of genuine pride. "Everything was a hassle", he writes of Screeching Weasel's tenure in the liners of Weasel Mania. "A lot of the fans were pricks and the mood in the van ranged from cartoonish therapy group for mental defectives to crank-fueled hockey fight, but somehow it managed to pretty fun. It's amazing what you can tolerate with youth on your side". With Weasel's acerbic wit and a sizable Ramones fetish as their guiding factors, Screeching Weasel tried to bring some laughs and energy back to a too-serious scene. They didn't always get it right, as Weasel Mania proves. But as it skips across the band's output since the baiting 1988 anthem "Hey Suburbia", it's clear that even when the songs were only rudimentary or the jokes fell more than flat, Screeching Weasel stuck brazenly to their guns. The My Brain Hurts material – "Cindy's on Methadone", "What We Hate," "Science of Myth", and the title track – endure as scrappy pop-punk Classics, angsty, peppy diagrams for a thousand Simple Plans since. "Science of Myth" in particular is a Ben Weasel classic, his overcompensating yell exploding in rapid-fire youth apathy as Danny Vapid fills in the razor guitar and Mike Mills-style backing vocals. The set includes the Wiggle era's shamelessly lowest common denominator Ramones romp "Jeannie's Got a Problem with Her Uteru", the Green Day answer song "I Wrote Holden Caulfield", and "Phasers on Kill" and the more effective Ramones romp "Cool Kids", both from 1996's Bark Like a Dog. Weasel Mania isn't the sort of thing you listen to in one setting. "The scene is dumb", "the kids are dumb", "getting old is dumb", "the Ramones and the Queers rule" – their perpetual themes just don't hold up. But Weasel's endearing for that same tenacious lethargy. You either love them or you hate them, and sometimes it seems like they're hoping for the latter. But there's no denying Screeching Weasel's influence, and in that Weasel Mania is their proper legacy.

~ Johnny Loftus, all media guide

Tracklist:

01. My Right
02. Ashtray
03. Supermarket Fantasy
04. Hey Suburbia
05. Cindy's On Methadone
06. My Brain Hurts
07. What We Hate
08. The Science Of Myth
09. She's Giving Me The Creeps
10. I Wanna Be A Homosexual
11. Jeannie's Got A Problem With Her Uterus
12. Joanie Loves Johnny
13. Peter Brady
14. Totally
15. Leather Jacket
16. Every Night
17. Planet Of The Apes
18. 99
19. I Wrote Holden Caulfield
20. Phasers On Kill
21. You Blister My Paint
22. Cool Kids
23. The First Day Of Summer
24. Racist Society
25. Dummy Up
26. Pervert At Large
27. Speed Of Mutation
28. My Own World
29. Video
30. Sidewalk Warrior
31. Static
32. Bottom Of The 9th
33. Gotta Girlfriend
34. You're The Enemy

all songs by Ben Weasel except
"4" by Ben Weasel/John Jughead
"9" by Ben Weasel/Dan Vapid
"10" by Weasel/Jughead/Vapid


Mastered by Mass Giorgini at Sonic Iguana.


Release Date: October 4, 2005
Label: Fat Wreck Chords
Catalog No.: FAT 696-2