Ranking the songs on Siouxsie and the Banshees’ seminal debut ‘The Scream’
Siouxsie and the Banshees formed in 1976, inspired by the obstinate attitudes of the Sex Pistols. After playing a last-minute set at the 100 Club Punk Festival due to the scheduled band pulling out, Siouxsie Sioux and Steven Severin decided to form a proper band, recruiting additional members to create Siouxsie and the Banshees.
Soon they became well-known live performers, selling out shows before they were even signed to a label. Eventually, spurred on by a piece of graffiti that read ‘Sign the Banshees: do it now,’ Polydor signed the band in 1978. A few months later, after a successful single, ‘Hong Kong Garden’, they released their debut album, The Scream. It has been labelled as one of the most influential post-punk albums of all time, heavily inspiring bands such as Joy Division, The Cure, Big Black, Sonic Youth and The Jesus and Mary Chain.
A landmark of the era, The Scream was borne from the punk landscape, yet it borrowed from other genres, incorporating the motorik rhythms of krautrock bands such as Can and Neu! and the glam art rock of David Bowie and Roxy Music. In an interview with Severin, he revealed how vital seeing Can perform was to the formation of the Banshees. “They came on and just played nonstop for two hours, each piece merging straight into the next. It had the most mesmerising effect on the audience. That’s what I wanted to achieve with the Banshees.”
The Scream pioneered a new kind of sound that is gloriously cinematic but fuzzy around the edges. Sioux’s enigmatic and theatrical voice is tinged with instability, often yelping over prominent basslines. Without further ado, here is a ranking of every song on Siouxsie and the Banshees’ debut album.
Ranking every song on The Scream by Siouxsie and the Banshees:
10. ‘Pure’
The Scream opens with ‘Pure’, the perfect piece to establish the album’s dark and mysterious sound. Sioux’s distant screams float around the back of the track as minimal instrumentation allows Severin’s ominous bass guitar to dominate. The tension slowly builds as sounds swirl around with a horror-movie sensibility.
The Banshees create a haunting atmosphere with their opening number, utilising Sioux’s voice as another instrument alongside the grinding guitars and foreboding drums.
9. ‘Surbarban Relapse’
Opening with a guitar riff inspired by Bernard Herrmann’s iconic score for Alfred Hitchcock’s groundbreaking 1960 horror Psycho, ‘Suburban Relapse’ conveys the hatred of living in the suburbs. The song’s repetitive nature reflects the monotony of suburbia, and the wavering, jolting quality of Sioux’s voice creates a disorientating atmosphere.
Discussing suburbia, Sioux once said it felt like being “stranded…left alone to create your own environment and use your imagination…we were all marooned on the outside.” She also said the suburbs “inspired intense hatred. I think the lure of London was always there. […] The suburbs were also a yardstick for measuring how much we didn’t fit in.”
8. ‘Overground’
On ‘Overground’, a driving guitar rhythm thrusts into consciousness, battling for dominance over Sioux’s deliciously layered vocals. The krautrock influence is evident, and just like ‘Suburban Recipe’, this repetition helps to convey a sense of entrapment.
Commenting on what is considered normal in society, Sioux declares, “Got to give up life in this netherworld/ Going to go up to where the air is stale/ And live a life of pleasantries/ And mingle in the modern families.”
7. ‘Carcass’
Opening with a classic punk-inspired sound, ‘Carcass’, the only song written before John McKay joined the band, sees Sioux enthusiastically sing about a crazed butcher. Lyrics such as “He’ll hide you from the cleaver, he’ll hang with you forever/ Longing for a fresh meat” and “Out of the frying pan and into the fire/ Mother had her son for tea” make for quite the unnerving listen.
Severin’s rich bassline accompanies an infectious guitar riff and beat that sounds like hands clapping. You cannot help but sing along to Sioux’s dark chorus, “Be a carcass, be a dead pork/ Be limblessly in love, be limblessly in love,” even if it is rather foreboding.
6. ‘Nicotine Stain’
Another track bearing a particular punk influence through its angular guitar riffs, ‘Nicotine Stain’ details the difficulty of giving up smoking due to the experience of withdrawal symptoms. The tone of McKay’s guitar has a distinctive Joy Division feeling, which makes it unsurprising that the band cited The Scream as one of their biggest influences.
Bassist Peter Hook shared, “The Banshees’ first LP was one of my favourite ever records, the way the guitarist and the drummer played was a really unusual way of playing.” Sioux’s evocative vocal performance on the track is particularly fantastic, allowing her voice to melt and mould with the instruments.
5. ‘Mirage’
The jaunty and slightly abrupt riffs that comprise ‘Mirage’ hide a darker message about society. Sioux encourages listeners to question what they see on television and not believe everything they hear. She stresses, “I’m just a vision on your TV screen/ Just something conjured from a dream/ Seen through your x-ray eyes, a see-through scene/ The image is no images, it’s not what it seems.”
Sioux channels her punk spirit by discussing the manipulation of the masses on ‘Mirage’. Contentious Smiths frontman Morrissey was such a fan of the song that he had it play during the intermission of all of his 1991 Kill Uncle shows.
4. ‘Helter Skelter’
Siouxsie and the Banshees put their own spin on The Beatles’ classic hit ‘Helter Skelter’, which first appeared on their 1968 self-titled album (more commonly known as The White Album). The fuzzy guitars give the track a grittier edge, more in keeping with the song’s association with Charles Manson.
The band’s cover of the track has regularly been labelled as the superior version, although this is a topic that definitely sparks heated debate. David Quantock, author of Revolution: The Making of the Beatles’ White Album, described the Banshees’ version as “the best of all of them.”
3. ‘Metal Postcard (Mittageisen)’
An electrifying riff pummels through ‘Metal Postcard (Mittageisen) that keeps up an active rhythm as Sioux spouts lyrics inspired by Nazi propaganda. Influenced by a quote spoken by Hermann Göring, “Iron always made a nation strong, butter and lard only made the people fat,” Sioux demonstrates how easily influential figures were able to spread their messages.
An isolated drum beat opens up the song, followed by a bassline, then a riff, and eventually, the piece comes together with the addition of Sioux’s vocals. She sings, “Metal is tough, metal will sheen/ Metal won’t rust when oiled and cleaned/ Metal is tough, metal will sheen/ Metal will rule in my master scheme”, which sounds like some kind of twisted nursery rhyme.
2. ‘Switch’
The closing track, ‘Switch’ is divided into three parts, and Sioux refers to a vicar, a doctor, and a scientist in relation to switching bodies and minds. The longest song on the album at nearly seven minutes, the piece traverses various sounds, beginning slowly – a guitar riff dominating, before picking up with a fuller sound. Eventually, a jagged riff cuts through, almost like a slowed-down version of ‘London Calling’ by The Clash, released two years later.
Despite its considerable length, the track never loses momentum, and the song’s final act is interlaced with distant trumpets and pounding drums. ‘Switch’ feels like a melting pot of emotions, both aggressive, danceable and melancholic – all wrapped into one.
1. ‘Jigsaw Feeling’
A moody bassline welcomes ‘Jigsaw Feeling’, which continues to power through whilst frenzied guitars come into frame. Lyrically, Sioux discusses disorientation and nervousness, asking an unknown force to “Send me forwards, say my feelings/ But all the signals send me reeling.” The dark soundscape created on the track perfectly encapsulates the album’s sound as a whole.
Jim Reid from The Jesus and Mary Chain once discussed the song’s influence on him, saying, “‘Jigsaw Feeling’ from The Scream album […] it was brilliant, amazing. That’s a reason why I made music.” Infused with a gothic sensibility akin to the Bauhaus track ‘Bela Lugosi’s Dead’, released in 1979, the song represented the Banshees’ ability to push punk sounds into new and darker territories.
