The 333 Best Pop Songs of the 2000s: #256

#256: "Kiss the Devil" (2004) - Eagles of Death Metal

Considering the title of the song and the name of the group, this record sounds positively antiquated—and it’s supposed to. First, the Eagles of Death Metal aren’t really a death-metal outfit; the name’s just a moniker meant to (jokingly—I think) conjure up aural images (what an oxymoron I am) of the Eagles playing death metal. And—that’s—not quite the sound here (though it’s some sort of nearby approximation). To be more accurate, the music is basically bluegrass filtered through distorted guitar, propelled by hell-bent-for-leather, march-step speed drumming.

This particular record seems like merely a joke, a one-off, a sonic riff on let’s throw this-and-that together and see what sticks—and it is all that, sure: the duo Jesse Hughes (vocals, guitar) and Josh Homme (drums, and also a guitarist/vocalist for Queens of the Stone Age) seem to be having fun, and the lyrics are deliberately (and jokingly) satanic; however, those satanic verses are balanced by a mixture of Carter-Family style bluegrass singing and a vocal style of what’s called Sacred Harp singing. This type of singing is no longer prominent anywhere, anymore (though there are Sacred Harp singers still out there--I know of one group in particular out of Alabama--they aren't prominent anymore), but it used to be how some mountaineers and southerners (again: some, but certainly not all) sang sacred material;. Sacred Harp singing consists of vocal harmonies not built on what many of us think of as traditional harmony, but in a harmony in which, traditionally, all the tenors would sing the same note, all the altos the same note, etc…. In other words, it sounds weird (and if you want to know more, then either check out Harry Smith’s Anthology of American Folk Music and its hefty--but well worth it--price tag, or rent the movie Cold Mountain, which—though not as fulfilling as the Smith recordings—gives an accurate depiction of this type of singing).

The Eagles of Death Metal mix their version of Sacred Harp singing (and they do it very well) with seemingly sacrilegious lyrics about kissing and loving the devil. I say seemingly because one could easily twist their lyrics only the slightest and you’d have authentic Sacred Harp music—well, authentic except for the distorted guitar, the drums, and the tambourine (playing off beat). The lyrics, though, help make this song stranger than it would be otherwise (and it’d be plenty strange no matter what was sung), and they add to the aura of sin this record seems to emanate. The result is chilling and exciting, and one could easily imagine Ol’ Scratch himself, cloven hooves and all, dancing around a fire, while the purported witches of Salem disrobed around him, getting all hot, sweaty, and funky, like something out of the old Swedish documentary Haxan. Man. If I’m not going to Hell for writing this, I’m sure ‘nough damned to dream of it.