(t5!) Heroes Of The Zeroes Singles: #05: Franz Ferdinand – Take Me Out (2004)

What happened to our rock & roll? It seems just yesterday when we were jumping up and down to Nirvana, The Smashing Pumpkins, and Foo Fighters of the ‘90’s. Then, nu-metal happened. And then, pop-punk happened. And then, emo happened. And then Nickelback happened. And just like that, sonically conservative modern rock was pushed aside and the underwhelmed droves shifted their interests to the energy of hip-hop, the recreation of dance, or the do-it-yourself adventure of indie.

But can we really let the oughts draw to a close without its own colossal rock anthem to rival the “Smells Like Teen Spirit”, “Zero”, and “Everlong” of the previous decade? Earlier submissions like The White Stripes’ “Seven Nation Army” and The Darkness’ “I Believe In A Thing Called Love” are acceptable, I guess. But these were exceptional because they were throwbacks to a time when rock was “good”. We needed something new. We needed something fresh. We needed our own rock song from our own era. We needed “Take Me Out” by Scotland’s Franz Ferdinand.

Now during this decade, American pop culture was intensely unkind to our companions across the pond. The forgettable, wispy singer/songwriters with a piano seemed to do well. Lady hip-hop figures, like M.I.A., Estelle, and Lady Sovereign got their time under the spotlight because of endorsements from North America’s biggest names. The most vital United Kingdom hits that made significant cultural blow were bands like Arctic Monkeys and The Libertines and rappers like Dizzee Rascal and The Street. However, they never reached Oasis and Spice Girls status even in their best days. Then these Scots came along, everything from the way they’re dressed to the way they wear their hair to their name absolutely communicated to North Americans that they’re outsiders. They’re not really reinventing the wheel with “Take Me Out”, but they also sounded like nothing else on the radio amidst the Breaking Benjamins and the Velvet Revolvers.

When it came out of the gate, though, it sure showed signs of being same ol’, same ol’. For the first 50 seconds of “Take Me Out”, it sounded like a serviceable indie rock song straight out of The Strokes’ discography. It would’ve been satisfactory, but it would’ve been the #431 single in this list if they proceeded towards that route. Franz Ferdinand, those cheeky bastards, had a thing or two up their sleeves, however. They slowed the beats per minute down to a menacing stomp and, PSYCHE, they blindsided us with a dance floor sensation that both the rock crew and everybody else can dance to. The key to all of it is Paul Thomson’s bass drums obviously. The rest of the band? They rally around the drummer’s kick, both entwining and syncing their mighty riffs with the booming ones. It’s practically why we irresistibly tap our toes throughout “Take Me Out”. The band gives us a blueprint to strut, stomp, swag, and disco with. And we would’ve been damn foolish if we refuse the movement. Rock’s existence in the future depended on us getting’ down to “Take Me Out”.

Franz Ferdinand never followed up the success of “Take Me Out”, regrettably. They only had another major single with “Do You Want To”, but the imprint they made in the zeroes with “Take Me Out” was significant enough that they will probably be canonized just from this song alone. They made disco-punk an allowable hybrid of genres once more, encouraging danceable hit singles from unlikely bands like Good Charlotte and Finger Eleven. Rock is exciting again and it’s all thanks to Scots crashing the tedious party of American rock a half-decade ago.