Jaimee Eat World

Salt

We talk a lot about Bleed American being the defining album for Jimmy Eat World – yes, it features their biggest hit The Middle, but the album has a whole really showed the band coming into their own and it’s the reason they’re still one of rock & emo’s most influential bands.

Certainly they were to me. I wasn’t and I’m still not the type of musician who is terribly interested in learning how to play other artists songs verbatim, but when I bought my first guitar two things I really wanted to learn that I knew would be important for understanding how to write great rock songs were Bleed American and the solo to The Middle.

Sweat

The Middle was a little out of my depth at 13 when I was still learning how to form standard chords with my fragile little hands, but when I mentioned Bleed American to the guitar teacher I had briefly and he had me bring in the record, after a quick listen he said, “oh yeah, you can do this one, it’s easy,” and I’ll be honest, that fucked me up a little.

In a good way. These songs weren’t as complicated as I thought they would be and that’s really encouraging when you’re trying to learn an instrument.

Almost rudely, he explained it wasn’t really a solo in Bleed American as it is a cool lead line, but who cares. He showed me the handful of notes that are being riffed on and we were off to the races. That was the last time I’d ever see that guitar teacher and as far as I’m concerned, he taught me all I needed to know. Thanks Troy.

Sugar

Lyrically this is one of the most interesting tracks in the bands entire catalogue and it’s sort of easy to overlook it when you’re just singing along to the chorus. There’s no way I appreciated it at 13, but when I listen back now I’m taken in a lot more by the clever wordplay and imagery.

I actually forgot for a long while that they say “I bled the greed from my arm,” in the bridge and had a funny, “Oh, right,yes, I suppose that’s why it’s called Bleed American” moment when I was listening closely again.

That line should have been way more controversial than the title of the track which had to be altered in the wake of 9/11 to Salt/Sweat/Sugar – I won’t even really get into that whole thing cause it’s ridiculous to me that anyone ever made the decision to change it to begin with. I didn’t hear about that alteration until years and years after the fact because, well, I’m Canadian – the song and record never changed its name here. The skeptic in me worries that there was no real controversy about this (because who the fuck is worried about this track title when we’re changing the entire airline industry to combat terrorist threats) and that was just a cheap marketing ploy by the record label at the time to sell more copies under a new name, kinda like how some artists now release 40 variants of the same record these days, but again, I have no idea – it never made any sort of news here to my knowledge and also I was 11.

Anyway, here’s Jimmy Eat World’s original recording:

I don’t think this track gets nearly as much attention as it should and I’d argue it’s the best on the album (before getting lost in the sheer catchy-ness of A Praise Chorus for the millionth time), so of course I’ve been apprehensive about tackling it.

When I first pulled it apart, I was drawn towards an idea of playing off the picket line imagery and making this into a folk protest song at a much slower tempo. I ran with that idea for a while, but then I went ahead and added a bass line that just really wanted to rock it out a bit more, so I amped it up a little.

Mine isn’t as heavy hitting as the band’s and it almost sits more in a alt-rock/grunge space, but with a more casual vocal delivery. I think it turned out pretty cool while keeping the general spirit of the original recording.

‘Til next week.