Screeching Weasel

1986. Ben Foster goes to a Ramones concert and there is enlightenment. Decided to imitate the New-Yrokae formation, he took a stage name, Ben Weasel and quickly created the band Screeching Weasel. The first member will be guitarist John Jughead, a friend with whom Ben had started working on compositions a year earlier. Then came drummer Steeve Cheese and finally, bassist Vinnie Bovine. The first concerts take place in front of a little flowery floor, in the middle of squattes or dilapidated cellars. The first demo tape was recorded in December 86. After a few months, fortune appears and they are offered to produce a first album. In reality, the studio is just a single bedroom apartment, but the Self-Titled actually comes out in the spring 87 on Underdog Records. Pressed at 3,000 copies, it sells only modestly (about 1,000) and is not re-pressed accordingly. The band spends most of the year playing on stage, picking up the buddies to finally reach a crowd of 50 or 60 people who fill the group with happiness. But a first line up change comes with the departure of Vinnie Bovine due to personal problems, in favor of a former member of the OzzFish Experience , Waren Ozzfish. Without further delay, the band signed on The Fledging Roadkill , so that under Weasel and Jughead could be released their second effort, Boogada Boogada Boogada ! This opus, with a rather rustic character, combining pop-punk, punk rock, hardcore influences, and derisions ("I Hate Led Zeppelin", "U.F.O.") sells much better than the previous one and the band, now expected, returns on tour. Toured somewhat enlivened because during his performance Steeve Cheese left the band, replaced subsequently by Bryan Vermine as well as Waren who left his place to Danny Vapid (Vocalist for bands such as Generation Waste or Igor Skulls .) All of these changes in line up did not prevent the group from going out later EPs and other Singles of variable quality, but the troubles were not finished, so Vermin and Vapid left the group in turn. Depts, Jughead and Weasel decreed that Screeching Weasel would no longer be. 1991, following a concert bringing together Weasel, Jughead, Vapid, Naked (guitarist of the new Weasel band) and a new drummer, Dan Panic, the combo is contacted by Lookout Record That's how the very ‘ramonesian', My Brain Hurts, comes out the same year. He followed Wiggle in 1992, which led the band on a record tour, generating a profit of $400 after six weeks, where until then, traveled with money loss. A year later appeared Anthem For A New Tomorrow followed by How To Make Enemies And Irritate People in 1994. However, an undeniable decrease in motivation will push the group to split again at the end of that year. After this new separation, Weasel, Vapid and Panic created a new band, Les Riverdales , always influenced by their heroes, the Ramones. Vapid contributed to Green Day's work during this period. Lookout decided to release a whole series of compilations, which pushed the band to take its name from Dantan, the Screeching Weasels, leaving Jughead to join the band again. The band then returned to work and gave birth in 1996 from Bark Like a Dog. 1998 saw the creation of their Panic Buttons Record label allowing them to bring out some old EP. Television City Dream , for its part, is born at Fat Wreck. Finally, 2001 was the fateful date with the band's last split, which, in spite of everything, reformed for a show in 2004, but which will not announce a new reformation, all the members now vading their new bands. The last galette about them will therefore be the compilation' Weasel Mania released at Fat in 2005.