Jawbreaker (band) - Lyrics and Influence

Lyrics and Influence

appeal was his publicly private torment. There was a bitterness and frustration in his lyrics that was both universal and magnetic. Schwarzenbach was the poet laureate of scruffy white male angst and, by couching his thoughts in his own inscrutable metaphors, he set a pattern for bands that would follow for the next decade.

Many of Schwarzenbach's lyrics were rooted in his specific concerns, often lifted directly from his journal. This focus on personal, immediate matters, coupled with descriptive imagery and word choices, attracted listeners to Schwarzenbach and made him a cult idol in emo circles. "The attraction then was to the songwriter," writes Greenwald in Nothing Feels Good: Punk Rock, Teenagers, and Emo, "it wasn't the song that the listeners related to, it was the singer." Jawbreaker's tour manager Christy Colcord recalls that "Most of hovered around Blake because he was, like, this poet to them. It was all these people who really wanted their heartbreak validated by someone who could understand—or wanted to drink whiskey with them." The idolization of Schwarzenbach came to be described as the Cult of Blake. According to rock critic Chris Ryan, "In terms of contemporary music, the Cult of Blake is probably matched only by the Cult of Morrissey".

Before Bivouac's release, Jawbreaker recorded the song "Kiss the Bottle" for a Mission District-themed compilation of vinyl singles titled 17 Reasons: The Mission District. It was the last song they recorded before Schwarzenbach's throat surgery, and his vocals on the recording are mottled and choked. Greenwald cites the track as "one of seminal and best-loved songs", calling it "sludgy and churning, a working-class anthem with a steady, proletarian heart". With lyrics profiling a pair of drunks outside a Mission District liquor store, "'Kiss the Bottle,' more than any other song, captures the sensitive boy machismo that drew (and continues to draw) male listeners to the altar of Schwarzenbach. With its fictional scrim, 'Kiss the Bottle' functions like a country song: the emotional impact is heightened by the specificity, not lessened. 'Kiss the Bottle' is Kerouac; it's Bukowski. It's the allure of giving into despair, to doing the wrong thing and at least succeeding at that." The song has been cited as a favorite and an influence by Jim Ward of At the Drive-In and Sparta, and by Ron Richards, editor of the successful zine Muddle.

Public interest in Jawbreaker increased in the years following their breakup, due in part to chart-toppings acts such as Fall Out Boy and My Chemical Romance publicly citing Jawbreaker as an influence. In 2003 Dying Wish Records released the tribute album Bad Scene, Everyone's Fault: Jawbreaker Tribute, featuring 18 acts including Fall Out Boy, Bayside, Face to Face, and Sparta performing cover versions of Jawbreaker songs.