Album Review: Scene Queen – Hot Singles In Your Area
Reviewed by Chris Taylor
One of the most divisive artists in Metal recently, Scene Queen (AKA Hannah Collins) is at last dropping her debut album. It will either be one of the most anticipated, or dreaded albums of the year depending on whom you ask.
Picture this, Ke$ha style pop hooks mixed with djenty mathcore breakdowns. It’s a huge juxtaposition, and that is exactly the point. The juggle between popular music and metal is intentional and the entire point of the album.
If the mere concept of these two widely opposing styles battling with each other is off putting to you then brace yourself because that is what you will be getting for the next fifteen tracks and it gives you no time at all to settle into that. BDSM (doesn’t stand for what you think) begins straight away with dissonant slamming chords and pounding drums, under chanted vocals. That being said it manages to feel very unsettling with the dark synths under the rapping in the verses, and the very harsh high screams in the last chorus before the outro. It’s a very clear opening statement of intent, this album is loud, chaotic and not afraid to hold back. By the end of this opener, you’ll know if you’re on board or not.
Once you are able to adjust to the sound of this album and are past the initial surprise of what this album throws at you, does the music itself still hold up?
Scene Queen clearly does know how to write a massive hook. Pink Push Up Bra has all the energy needed to fire up a crowd and the chorus of Mutual Masturbation is undeniably catchy.
Girls Gone Wild lives up to its namesake, though you could have guessed that when Wargasm features on the track. Love these two artists or hate them, it’s a perfect collaboration with both artists complementing each other perfectly.
Oral Fixation is the highlight as far as guitars go. The fast, frenetic rhythm stands out among the downtuned djenty riffing that fills the rest of the album.
It leads into the closing track Climax which is much more mellow than everything before. It allows Collins to demonstrate her vocal ability without all the chaos, and also has the most heartfelt lyrics of the album that don’t lean on irony or satire, instead lamenting on the concept of endings.
Admittedly though, despite that surprisingly heartfelt outro, the high energy of the album can be exhausting to sit through for fifteen tracks straight. The album certainly could have shaved off a couple of songs. Milf can get in the bin for example. The sudden country style song was probably added for some variety but even at less than two minutes it’s gimmick wears thin and the heavy breakdowns are much more flimsy than the others on the album. Stuck also feels out of place for being a straight up pop track, or at least it would be were it not for the lyrics.
Despite those two tracks, the music does indeed work. Utilising pop sensibilities is nothing new for Metal these days yet this is probably as stark a contrast as you’ll find. Despite that though it does create a weird sense of unease that feels completely intentional. Even when the djenty guitars drop out, you can hardly relax given how they could reappear without warning, 18+ is a perfect example of this. Not only that but hearing the lyrics rapped/sung so bluntly allows the listener to clearly hear how dark the themes on this album can be.
So that leads onto the album’s subject matter. Heavy Metal tackles your usual transgressive subject matter. Yet evidently sexual obscenity still manages to shock. A tactic Scene Queen is more than happy to use.
It’s impossible to ignore the message of this album, it quite clearly doesn’t want you too. Whether it’s celebrating personal freedoms, or calling out the rampant misogyny and abuse within the music business, sex is THE primary topic of Hot Singles in the Area. You only need to look at the titles to know exactly what you’re getting into, with Finger, Oral Fixation and Climax being about exactly what you think they are.
Interestingly the album seems to be split in two, with tackling the misogyny of the industry in the first half, and sexual freedom in the second. It’s up to personal preference which you prefer but perhaps a reshuffle of the track order would keep things more varied.
Nevertheless, using the music as such a pointed finger at everything wrong with the music industry is undoubtedly a refreshing take. 18+ goes after all the bands that have been exposed for their disgraceful actions on tour. The text-to-speech reciting an all too typical statement we’ve seen from many bands in recent years, would be hilarious were it not grimly real. Mutual Masturbation’s explicit imagery calls out how the male dominated scene actively excludes women from breaking in, and Whips and Chains is an outpouring of aggression in retaliation to sexual assault.
This music isn’t subtle, and nor should it be. Scene Queen on this album clearly wants to point out the misogyny, elitism and all other things messed up about the male dominated industry that Collins finds herself in. At the risk of looking way too deep into this, it seems like two disparate styles of music are meant to show the two sides of the music industry. The packaged, melodic pop sounds demonstrate the package that is produced and ‘sold’ to the consumer whereas the metal represents the grotesque underbelly of the industry. Or it’s simply meant to shock and be unique. Either way, it certainly is unique.
The music is the very definition of ‘acquired taste’ and it may be fair to say the messages overshadow the music itself. But whether it is to your taste or not, Scene Queen has something to say, and now more than ever it’s worth listening to.
