Screaming Females

New Jersey indie rockers Screaming Females were only one-third female, but did indeed scream when the song called for it. Founder and frontwoman Marissa Paternoster began playing guitar at 14, four years later she attended Rutgers University to study art. There she met drummer Jarrett Dougherty and bassist "King Mike" Abbate; the three began rehearsing in dorms and basements and launched Screaming Females in 2005. After playing more than 100 shows in their first year, they released their debut album Baby Teeth in 2006. The sound was especially raw at first, with a distorted guitar sound that brought Dinosaur Jr. to mind. Paternoster would become more melodic over time, though the oblique, poetic nature of her lyrics would remain. The social structure of the band-with one lesbian and two straight guys-also provided a hook for early interviewers. They teamed with producer Steve Albini (who'd produced one of Paternoster's favorite bands, the Pixies) for the 2012 album Ugly, the first to get mainstream media attention. That year Paternoster placed at #77 in Spin magazine's list of 100 greatest guitarists (a purposely unconventional list headed by Lee Ranaldo & Thurston Moore of Sonic Youth). Screaming Females also had a successful tour with Garbage, on which Paternoster formed a friendship with singer Shirley Manson and often joined the headliner onstage (That tour also saw her missing a number of shows after coming down with mono). The two bands later teamed in the studio for a single, covering the Patti Smith/Bruce Springsteen hit "Because the Night." 2013 brought two fiollow albums that showed the band's raw side: Live at the Hideout caught the intensity of a live show, while the cassette release Chalk Tape captured songs written on the spur of the moment, after the outlines were posted on a chalkboard. Another change of producers (to Matt Bayles of Pearl Jam fame) brought 2015's Rose Mountain, with less noise and stronger songcraft than before. Bayles remained onboard for 2918's All at Once, which included some metallic and almost-prog moments along with the now-usual pop, pop and guitar-trio heroics.