Speaker 1: Welcome to stuff you should know, a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2: Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh and there's
Speaker 2: Chuck and I'm not going to scream to start this
Speaker 2: off because I care about all of you listening.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that was a new for you. Yeah, we're talking about.
Speaker 1: Julia helped us out with this one, and I commissioned
Speaker 1: this one. And I don't remember what instigated it. It
Speaker 1: definitely wasn't from hearing somebody scream. I may have seen
Speaker 1: an article or something that piqued my interest and I
Speaker 1: was like, wait a minute, what like screaming? Is interesting
Speaker 1: that people scream and for all different kinds of reasons
Speaker 1: people scream, and that's why I picked it.
Speaker 2: Here we are. Yeah, I was very surprised and impressed this.
Speaker 2: It's one of those ones where you just think you
Speaker 2: know about it because you never really thought about it.
Speaker 2: When you diving into it. There's a lot more to
Speaker 2: it than you ever realized. Although all of it makes
Speaker 2: sense anecdotally, you're like, oh, yeah, oh yeah, I've done that.
Speaker 2: I've screamed like that. I'd screamed and screamed and screamed
Speaker 2: again it. Yeah, I like ones like this. I guess
Speaker 2: human human nature explained, and there's a comment there somewhere.
Speaker 1: Somewhere in there definitely not a colon. We should get
Speaker 1: some nuts and bolts out of the way. As far
Speaker 1: as like, everyone knows what a scream is. It's obviously
Speaker 1: a very loud, high pitched, harsh thing on the ears.
Speaker 1: It's a sound that you make with I was about say,
Speaker 1: with your mouth, but we'll get to the parts that
Speaker 1: make the scream. But nuts and bolts wise, the scream
Speaker 1: is in about the eighty to one hundred and twenty
Speaker 1: decibel range. In volume, sixty decibels is normal speech unless
Speaker 1: you're my wife. That's more like an A seventy five.
Speaker 1: I would say she and her her friend Stacy, or
Speaker 1: to the loudest humans on earth, and they admit that
Speaker 1: they're not wallflowers, and they own it and I respect it.
Speaker 1: Nice they reach frequent Not Stacey and Emily, but humans.
Speaker 1: I'm sorry. The human scream can reach a frequency in
Speaker 1: the range of two thousand to three thousand herts, whereas
Speaker 1: a normal talker is about eighty to three hundred herts.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and for dumb dums with sound like me, the
Speaker 2: higher the hurts, the higher the pitch, so hurts is
Speaker 2: a measure of actual frequency. Pitch is basically a measure,
Speaker 2: a description of how we experience that frequency.
Speaker 1: That's right, And just to clear up something for what's
Speaker 1: coming later. A sound, a tone can have two different frequencies.
Speaker 2: I've got it. I have it now.
Speaker 1: Okay, that's it.
Speaker 2: No, I can't wait to explain it later because it's
Speaker 2: gonna get flubbed all over the place.
Speaker 1: Well, it isn't intuitive like you would think, like a
Speaker 1: guitar string makes like, you know, one frequency range. But
Speaker 1: it's just yeah, it's not true. It's one of those things.
Speaker 2: Yeah, this is not true. We'll just leave it at that.
Speaker 2: But we're getting ahead of ourselves, chuck.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Back to screaming, right.
Speaker 2: Yeah, because if you think about screaming, I always think
Speaker 2: of someone screaming, usually in a horror movie or something
Speaker 2: like that. I haven't heard too many, like real deal
Speaker 2: screams in real life, which is nice. But we're not
Speaker 2: the only animals that scream. There's plenty of other animals
Speaker 2: in the animal kingdom that scream that we know of.
Speaker 2: I'm quite sure there's plants that scream too, we just
Speaker 2: can't hear them. Maybe but birds scream, seals, marmots, mountain lions,
Speaker 2: and I didn't know giraffes scream. That's got to be
Speaker 2: off putting. The funniest scream of all as a goat screaming. Yeah,
Speaker 2: if you have never witnessed a goat scream, go right
Speaker 2: now to YouTube and just look up goat screaming videos.
Speaker 2: And they don't all scream the same way, but every
Speaker 2: once in a while, one of them is going to
Speaker 2: come along and scream like a man. And it is like,
Speaker 2: you will, you can't not laugh out loud when you
Speaker 2: see it. Every time I watched the same goat scream
Speaker 2: over and over again, and I laughed out loud every
Speaker 2: time I watched it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and it's so non goat sounding because it's not
Speaker 1: even like a loud bleat that you wonder like, is
Speaker 1: somebody punking me? And that's just like, you know, that's
Speaker 1: James con from misery that they're looping in there.
Speaker 2: Does kind of sound like that. Another one to look
Speaker 2: up real quick, or two links in Ontario screaming at
Speaker 2: each other. It's like right in their faces. Have you
Speaker 2: seen that one?
Speaker 1: I haven't seen that.
Speaker 2: Oh, it's it's nuts.
Speaker 1: Animals well, they Well, let's just talk about why anything screams.
Speaker 1: It's a very effective tool. It's obviously a great fear
Speaker 1: response because everyone's going to sit up and take notice
Speaker 1: because it's so harsh and loud. It's a very jarring thing.
Speaker 1: It can also distract predators, obviously, screaming if you're lost,
Speaker 1: you know, scream can travel a great distance in the
Speaker 1: woods or anywhere, and you can, you know, alert somebody
Speaker 1: from a great distance. So it's a it's a great
Speaker 1: communicative tool for humans and animals alike.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and that loudness. I saw the Guinness record for
Speaker 2: the loudest scream is one hundred and twenty nine decibels,
Speaker 2: which is one decibel under a jet engine and almost
Speaker 2: in almost ten times louder than a police siren.
Speaker 1: Wonder you that was.
Speaker 2: I don't know, but man, I can't imagine that they
Speaker 2: did that too many times because, as we'll see, screaming
Speaker 2: can really mess up your your neck junk.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's really gross. I'm getting older, so I'm getting
Speaker 1: more and more neck junk.
Speaker 2: Stress and neck chunk too.
Speaker 1: All right, So humans are are born with this ability.
Speaker 1: We know how to scream right away because we come
Speaker 1: out of the womb screaming. In fact, that's a very
Speaker 1: comforting sound when a baby is born, is that first scream.
Speaker 1: They're going to clear that flem in their airway so
Speaker 1: they can breathe. It lets everybody know, Hey, I'm here,
Speaker 1: I'm ready for action. I'm feeling good despite the fact
Speaker 1: that I'm screaming. If a baby is born and there
Speaker 1: is no scream, that is a very scary, scary moment
Speaker 1: for parents and everybody in that room.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I can imagine. It's like there the one time
Speaker 2: we're not screaming means that there's an issue.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, totally.
Speaker 2: And there's a lot of information in a baby's scream.
Speaker 2: It says I'm in distress, I'm in pain, I could
Speaker 2: use a gnash. There's just a lot that makes a
Speaker 2: parent because we're tuned to this kind of thing, especially
Speaker 2: if you're the parent of that baby. Studies show that
Speaker 2: you respond to your own baby's cries or screams a
Speaker 2: lot more easily or quickly than somebody who is not
Speaker 2: the parent into that baby. But you rush over there
Speaker 2: and you say, here's some food, here's a little blanket,
Speaker 2: and way to go. You just got all the phlegm
Speaker 2: out of your throat, so now you can breathe normally.
Speaker 1: Yeah. I remember when you met Ruby as a baby
Speaker 1: and she was screaming, and you're like, what the hell's
Speaker 1: wrong with this kid?
Speaker 2: Yeah? I just you know, I tried to bounce around
Speaker 2: my knee faster and it did the opposite help.
Speaker 1: And I said, oh, Josh, I'm in tune already, not
Speaker 1: in tune, tuned already. I was also in tune. And
Speaker 1: I said, that just means she's hungry. So just raise
Speaker 1: your shirt. Yeah, her what she needs.
Speaker 2: That didn't work either. She got like hair in her
Speaker 2: mouth though.
Speaker 1: Oh my god, this got really disturbing very fast.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we got it out.
Speaker 1: What about that cat cry?
Speaker 2: So, there is a a syndrome that's colloquially called I
Speaker 2: think creed a shot cry of the cat in French,
Speaker 2: and it has some similarities to down syndrome. But one
Speaker 2: of the defining characteristics of creed a shot is a
Speaker 2: larynx mauthformation, so that babies, when they cry, like the
Speaker 2: loud screaming cry, have a make us, a very specific
Speaker 2: cry that sounds very much like a cat crying. Yeah,
Speaker 2: if like you can find a couple of videos on
Speaker 2: YouTube of people with their baby with crew to a
Speaker 2: shot of crying, and it's it's really cute in a
Speaker 2: lot of ways. But also you're like, that sounds a
Speaker 2: lot like a cat, And it's so distinct that you
Speaker 2: can actually initially diagnose an infant with crewdishot syndrome because
Speaker 2: of their cry. It's that distinct.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So I mean that's a benefit that can save
Speaker 1: a lot of time and discomfort for this kid and
Speaker 1: diagnosing this kind of condition exactly, it's great. It also
Speaker 1: is a sign obviously when a kid is screaming saying hey, parent,
Speaker 1: go into fight or flight mode because I need something,
Speaker 1: and you know, if it's one of distress, even more
Speaker 1: so obviously and not just like I'm hungry, like beer distress.
Speaker 1: I don't know that we need to discuss fighter flight
Speaker 1: in detail because we did it three hundred and sixty
Speaker 1: four times over the first like five years of the show, right,
Speaker 1: but everyone knows what that is, right, Yeah, I.
Speaker 2: Would think, so, I don't think we really need to
Speaker 2: describe fight or flight.
Speaker 1: You're like, uh, but it's uh, I didn't.
Speaker 2: I stopped myself. I exercise a great restraint. Nice work, Okay, Well, anyway,
Speaker 2: I'll take it from here, Chuck. Yeah, because the reason
Speaker 2: you brought that up is screams activate fireflight mode in
Speaker 2: some really like basic ways, as we'll see. And so
Speaker 2: a scream actually activates in you a human who hears
Speaker 2: a scream, that that readiness to like either spring into
Speaker 2: action or run like hell or freeze or fawn is
Speaker 2: the other one now, because the fight or flight syndromes
Speaker 2: really come a long way since we last talked about it,
Speaker 2: And fawn is the response that you want when a
Speaker 2: baby's crying. You want to go over and be like, oh,
Speaker 2: it's okay.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's here. Never mind abandoned that line of thought.
Speaker 1: So let's talk about sound for a minute. Because all
Speaker 1: sound comes from and is perceived by us through a
Speaker 1: series of processes in the brain, and most of these
Speaker 1: are in the higher brain region. But screams are different.
Speaker 1: They happen in the lower brain region. And it's a
Speaker 1: very interesting thing. It kind of lives in its own
Speaker 1: as far as like humans making sound lives in its
Speaker 1: own area. It's very distinct from all the other sounds
Speaker 1: we make.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and it's a lot faster to basically activate us
Speaker 2: than the normal speech that we hear. Right, So when
Speaker 2: you talk, when you're making just talk like I am
Speaker 2: right now, say this is a good example. I'm using
Speaker 2: this description as an example in real time. Okay, that's right.
Speaker 2: So I'm using my laryngeal motor cortex that's basically running
Speaker 2: the show right now, and that is a higher brain process. Right,
Speaker 2: So I'm using cognition. I'm figuring out how my mouse
Speaker 2: should move, which also requires fine motor coordination and processing sound.
Speaker 2: I think from our Internal Dialogue episode, I'm doing a
Speaker 2: quick quality check right before I actually say the words
Speaker 2: yeah and Josh exactly, and do I sound like a
Speaker 2: muppety tenor I do, let's go. And then this stuff
Speaker 2: is sent to the brain stem, which basically says, okay,
Speaker 2: laryings and vocal cords and lungs and abdominal muscles, let's talk.
Speaker 2: That's normal speech. And again it requires a lot of
Speaker 2: higher brain processing. Screaming uses a different set of equipment
Speaker 2: to make itself happen. It's nuts because you think screaming
Speaker 2: is a form of speech. It's actually not. Even though
Speaker 2: we use a lot of the same stuff, a lot
Speaker 2: of the same bait and tackle, say like it's its
Speaker 2: own thing, which is I just find this is where
Speaker 2: I'm like, Okay, this is super fascinating.
Speaker 1: Now, yeah, that's right. So for screams, uh, and some
Speaker 1: involuntary vocalizations, but really screams, the sound production takes a
Speaker 1: different and, like you said, a much faster path. The
Speaker 1: signal starts in the limbic system and it skips that
Speaker 1: higher brain processing. Uh. The it happens in the amygdala. Basically,
Speaker 1: the emotional stimulus that the amygdala is all about just
Speaker 1: sends a scream signal. It's it's sort of like a
Speaker 1: direct path, like a express train through that brain stem
Speaker 1: to all the anatomy that you were talking about in
Speaker 1: your in your the you know, the neck junk, and
Speaker 1: that scream just comes out immediately. And the craziest part
Speaker 1: is our body actually picks up on this before our
Speaker 1: ears and brain can even process what we've just heard.
Speaker 2: Yeah, once the scream comes out of someone else, when
Speaker 2: we hear that scream, it puts us in fight or
Speaker 2: flight mode before we're even consciously aware that we have
Speaker 2: heard a scream. That's how that's how finely tuned we
Speaker 2: are too responding to screams, which again, this is something
Speaker 2: you just think exists out there, and then when you
Speaker 2: dig in, you're like, my god. So there's like a
Speaker 2: whole set of processes that take place that again are
Speaker 2: different than how we would respond if we hear regular speech, right,
Speaker 2: So it follows some of the same processes. It hits
Speaker 2: the outer ear, goes through the ear canal, the ear
Speaker 2: drum goes boom boom. That is amplified in the middle ear,
Speaker 2: and that goes onto the cochlia, which triggers a wave
Speaker 2: along the basel or membrane, which says, I'm going to
Speaker 2: turn this into an electrical signal, sends it to the
Speaker 2: auditory nerve, which sends it to the brain stem and
Speaker 2: then to the thalamus. And the thalamus is the sensory
Speaker 2: clearing house. It sends this to that and that to that.
Speaker 2: All of your sensory information goes to the thalamus. And
Speaker 2: here is where it diverges from normal speech.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And I mean that's why when somebody screams, like
Speaker 1: a blood curling scream out in public, you're instantly reacting.
Speaker 1: You don't hear that and then decide like, well, maybe
Speaker 1: I should go see what's going on over there, Like
Speaker 1: your body is instantly reacting because it is unconsciously picked
Speaker 1: up on that screen before it's even registered in your brain.
Speaker 1: So it's really a pretty remarkable sort of evolutionary trait.
Speaker 1: I think, like to help rescue, you know, probably back
Speaker 1: in Tiktook's days, the wife or baby that the husband
Speaker 1: who's out hunting and gathering has to protect from whatever
Speaker 1: dangers are around the fire.
Speaker 2: Yeah, And the reason why that happens is because when
Speaker 2: it hits that balance, it gets sent two different ways. Like,
Speaker 2: it gets sent the normal way to that higher brain processing,
Speaker 2: and when it goes through that higher brain processing, that's
Speaker 2: when you become conscious of hearing that scream. But what's
Speaker 2: happened even faster is it got sent to that amygdala
Speaker 2: and that sent in the fight or flight response, and
Speaker 2: that happened before your higher brain finished processing, which is
Speaker 2: just so there's this own pathway for just screams that
Speaker 2: the human brain has evolved to basically make you able
Speaker 2: to respond to a scream faster. It has its own expressway.
Speaker 2: Screams only essentially, is what it says, and if your
Speaker 2: regular speech you try to use that same expressway. It's
Speaker 2: got those tire bursting spikes that will just stop you
Speaker 2: cold right there, and they'll send you back along the
Speaker 2: way you're supposed to go to the higher brain.
Speaker 1: You go back to talk toown buddy exactly.
Speaker 2: And it's gonna take you a while to get there
Speaker 2: because you don't have tires. You're driving on just rims
Speaker 2: now because you were domin made a poor decision.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and you shouldn't do that because you're gonna damage
Speaker 1: those rims. You need to pull over immediately.
Speaker 2: Yeah. Bad.
Speaker 1: Should we take a break?
Speaker 2: Yeah? I think so.
Speaker 1: All right, we're gonna take a break and come back,
Speaker 1: and Josh is gonna explain something called the roughness domain
Speaker 1: right after this.
Speaker 2: All right, chuck, here we go. Here's the flubbing.
Speaker 1: Okay, well we'll see. It's a little brain breaking, but
Speaker 1: we'll get it.
Speaker 2: I think it's one of those things where if I
Speaker 2: just thought too hard about it and I've made it
Speaker 2: brain breaking. But so, screams have something in common, and
Speaker 2: that is that they exist in a region of human
Speaker 2: perception that's called the roughness domain. Okay, And if you
Speaker 2: take someone's voice right, it has a certain frequency. My
Speaker 2: voice has a certain frequency. You can recognize it as mine.
Speaker 2: But you can take my voice and make it modulate, right,
Speaker 2: So like the British police car that goes.
Speaker 1: Dude, do do do do doo?
Speaker 2: That's modulating right. So it has its own its own frequency, right,
Speaker 2: but you're making it change pitch do do do do?
Speaker 2: So that's a second frequency that it has. And if
Speaker 2: that frequency is between thirty hurts and one hundred and
Speaker 2: fifty hertz, that modulation between up and down or left
Speaker 2: and right, however you want to look at it. That
Speaker 2: is that roughness area. And it also seems to be
Speaker 2: reserved as far as human sounds go, just for screams.
Speaker 1: Yeah, there was a study. They learned this because of
Speaker 1: a study.
Speaker 2: We how'd I do?
Speaker 1: Oh? You'd a great? Okay kid, I'm sorry I didn't
Speaker 1: the customary thank you.
Speaker 2: We usually edit the colaps out. I think we should
Speaker 2: leave that one in.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, let's leave that one in. They know this
Speaker 1: because in twenty fifteen NYU, the neuroscientists, theyre published a
Speaker 1: study supporting this role of amplitude modulation. And the crazy
Speaker 1: part is that the only other sound in that rough
Speaker 1: this domain, like that's the only sound a human can make.
Speaker 1: That's like that. The only other sounds are all artificial alarms.
Speaker 1: So the human screen lives in the roughest domain alongside
Speaker 1: sirens and car alarms and you know, just other other
Speaker 1: like claxon. Maybe what is that?
Speaker 2: Is that the bad guys in Doctor Who?
Speaker 1: I think a claxon is the Eh?
Speaker 2: Oh those are terrible, like pull your credit card out
Speaker 2: of the card terminal.
Speaker 1: Does it actually do that?
Speaker 2: Yes, so they did originally. I think they've kind of stopped,
Speaker 2: but it would used to be really jarring.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, because that's the sound that happens when
Speaker 1: a nuclear facility is melting down.
Speaker 2: Right, forget your credit card, melt on a nuclear facility,
Speaker 2: basically the same thing.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So thanks NYU for that. Right.
Speaker 2: Well, okay, that was just part one of this study.
Speaker 2: This is a really robust study. So they analyzed recorded
Speaker 2: sounds and they found that screams were all in roughness
Speaker 2: and the only other sounds that were in there were alarms. Right.
Speaker 2: Then they got a bunch of volunteers, almost guaranteed NYU
Speaker 2: undergrads looking for extra credit, and they said, we want
Speaker 2: you to make a bunch of sounds. We want you
Speaker 2: to scream, we want you to speak normally, we want
Speaker 2: you to scream speak yeah, and make a bunch of
Speaker 2: meaningless vocalizations like yips, yammers, yelps, that whole thing, right, sure,
Speaker 2: And then they analyzed those just like they analyzed the
Speaker 2: recorded sounds, and they found that all of the scream
Speaker 2: sounds were in the roughness domain, and all of the
Speaker 2: non scream sounds, including yips and yamers, were not in
Speaker 2: the roughness domain whatsoever. So they're really zeroing in. And
Speaker 2: yet there's more to this study. This is how robust
Speaker 2: it was.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So then they said, all right, we got all
Speaker 1: this collection of sounds, neutral sounds is what we'll call,
Speaker 1: the ones that aren't screams, and then the screamy things.
Speaker 1: And they brought in some other volunteers, other NYU students
Speaker 1: for sure, and said, all right, we want you to
Speaker 1: rate the scariness like maybe on a one to ten,
Speaker 1: one to five, who knows what they used, maybe a
Speaker 1: Yelp star system, and they said, rate the scariness of
Speaker 1: the sounds. All the sounds in the roughness domain. This
Speaker 1: is pretty obvious. We're rated as scarier than the neutral sounds.
Speaker 1: And the sounds that were rated the scariest were the
Speaker 1: ones that were highest on the roughness scale.
Speaker 2: All makes sense, right, So they're really drilling down here.
Speaker 2: It keeps going, everybody. They actually took volunteers, probably the
Speaker 2: same ones who rated the scariness of the sounds, and
Speaker 2: they scanned them while they were listening to scary sounds
Speaker 2: and not just screamed but also the artificial alarms too,
Speaker 2: and probably some of the nonsense sounds and musical sounds,
Speaker 2: And as they were listening, the scream and the alarms
Speaker 2: were the only ones that cause spikes in the amygdala. Remember,
Speaker 2: the amygdala is where that set aside pathway for screams is,
Speaker 2: and that the higher on the roughness scale, if you
Speaker 2: can call it that, that the screams or alarms were,
Speaker 2: the greater the amygdala activity, and then the greater the
Speaker 2: amygdala activity that was shown in the scans, the higher
Speaker 2: those sounds had been rated for scariness by the volunteers previously.
Speaker 2: And when they wrapped it up and put all this together,
Speaker 2: they were like, I forgot what we were studying in
Speaker 2: the first place.
Speaker 1: So the upshot, to borrow a term from Josh, is
Speaker 1: that it seems like humans are specifically attuned and our
Speaker 1: amygdala is specifically activated by the sound of a scream,
Speaker 1: to say like, hey, it's time to panic or it's
Speaker 1: time to kick into high gear. They found that this
Speaker 1: works if you're awake or asleep. Yeah, at the rough
Speaker 1: vocalizations and that rough domain that we were talking about
Speaker 1: penetrate human sleep cycles more than neutral vocalizations. And that's
Speaker 1: not to say that like, yeah, of course it's louder, dummy.
Speaker 1: We're not talking about decibels here, We're talking about a
Speaker 1: frequency range. Like I think what they're saying and correct
Speaker 1: me if I'm wrong, is that is that a scream
Speaker 1: that might be the same decibel level as like a
Speaker 1: really loud talk will penetrate that sleep cycle unlike that
Speaker 1: really loud talk.
Speaker 2: Yes, And they think it's because the amygdala is tuned
Speaker 2: to that thirty to one hundred and fifty hertz rightness band.
Speaker 2: So the amygdala has its own route for getting you
Speaker 2: aroused and not necessarily in the best way when you
Speaker 2: hear a scream, and it's also listening out to a
Speaker 2: specific band of modulation to that screams existence. So clearly,
Speaker 2: thanks to our NYU researchers back in twenty fifteen, scream
Speaker 2: are a really important and kind of overlooked part of
Speaker 2: human speech right, and yeah for sure, and they think also, Chuck,
Speaker 2: that not only has like have we evolved to develop
Speaker 2: this alarm system, which clearly is what it is, because
Speaker 2: not only you're saying help, you're also, depending on how
Speaker 2: nice or altruistic the people listening are, you're also saying
Speaker 2: look out, there's danger, and they may run away if
Speaker 2: they're flee or they might run to you to help
Speaker 2: you if they're ready to fight. But they also have
Speaker 2: shown that screams have evolved in other ways too, Like
Speaker 2: we don't scream just out of an alarm system anymore.
Speaker 2: There's actually at least six other screams that they discovered
Speaker 2: that correlate or correspond to six other separate emotions.
Speaker 1: Yeah, anger, of course is going to be one you
Speaker 1: can scream at somebody in traffic.
Speaker 2: There's a europe song called scream of Anger. Really in Europe,
Speaker 2: of course, is known for a different song.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but you know what I heard? Oh what was it?
Speaker 1: That other europe song I forgot about the other day
Speaker 1: on hair Nation on serious except OK, which I'm still
Speaker 1: pounding by the way, I can't get away from it.
Speaker 1: I'm so back into the hair metal. It's really funny
Speaker 1: that's awesome. What was it? Keep on walking that road
Speaker 1: and I'll follow. Yeah, and if a mirror shit break, superstitious.
Speaker 2: That was Europe.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that was Europe. That was another big song besides
Speaker 1: Final Countdown.
Speaker 2: Okay, well so Scream of It it's a great song. Okay,
Speaker 2: Scream of Anger is even better. It's like actual metal tinge.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, you just made me think of Europe.
Speaker 1: They're They're definitely not screamers. They had voices of angels.
Speaker 1: They did obviously screaming fear, which is kind of one
Speaker 1: of the things we've been talking about. Screaming in pain.
Speaker 1: That's something that I have never experienced. I've been I've
Speaker 1: felt great deals of physical pain, but I'm very internal.
Speaker 1: I kind of go inward. But I've been to emergency rooms,
Speaker 1: and a screamer in an emergency room is a very
Speaker 1: unsettling situation.
Speaker 2: Yeah, for sure. The one I always associate with that
Speaker 2: is Tom Berenger telling that guy who got shot in
Speaker 2: the gut and platoon to eat the pain.
Speaker 1: Uh yeah, that's right.
Speaker 2: That guy was definitely screaming in pain.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, he put his hand over his mouth, was
Speaker 1: that j Yeah.
Speaker 2: So there's also this one's great scream of extreme joy.
Speaker 1: Yeah, like at a concert.
Speaker 2: Maybe, sure, that's one. Or if you watch The Simpsons
Speaker 2: and go back and watch I think the murder House
Speaker 2: episode where Marge is a real estate agent selling a
Speaker 2: murder house to Ned Flanders. You hear a terrible scream
Speaker 2: and it turns out it's Ned Flanders screaming in joy
Speaker 2: because there's purple drapes in the house. It's great. Just
Speaker 2: go look it up. It's like a tense, pretty good clip.
Speaker 1: I guess you know we're not going to dance around this.
Speaker 1: We're adults here, obviously during intercourse and orgasm can produce
Speaker 1: quite a scream, I'm told.
Speaker 2: Yeah, next to that, I just have an ellipse.
Speaker 1: Right, intense pleasure, so you know that extreme joy and
Speaker 1: intense pleasure probably encapsulates both of those if you're doing
Speaker 1: it right. And then a scream of sadness, and I
Speaker 1: guess this is just like wailing.
Speaker 2: Plus yeah, I feel like this one may have just
Speaker 2: been mislabeled because I think you can make a case
Speaker 2: that what they're describing here is actually a scream of
Speaker 2: emotional pain, not physical pain. Emotional pain and.
Speaker 1: What's the sadness? Is right.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I guess so so sure. I mean, maybe it's
Speaker 2: just me that was like, no, that's wrong. A really
Speaker 2: good example of it as far as movies go, is
Speaker 2: Tony Collette in Hereditary.
Speaker 1: Oh God, she.
Speaker 2: Finds out that her daughter has died. It's yeah, wrenching
Speaker 2: the work she does, like like, oh my god, it's
Speaker 2: really tough to watch, and of course it's all over
Speaker 2: the internet.
Speaker 1: I am about to say something I thought I would
Speaker 1: never say. I think I would like to see that
Speaker 1: movie again.
Speaker 2: Oh what did you not like it the first time?
Speaker 1: I loved it, but it was it's a tough movie.
Speaker 1: Oh it was one of those where I was like, wow,
Speaker 1: that was amazing. But I don't think I need to
Speaker 1: see that ever again. But I think I might want
Speaker 1: to because it was really that great.
Speaker 2: I've seen people here there describe it as potentially the
Speaker 2: darkest dark comedy around.
Speaker 1: Oh interesting.
Speaker 2: And there's there's this one part that I think kind
Speaker 2: of supports it. Do you remember the part where Steven
Speaker 2: is in the classroom and he messes himself up pretty good?
Speaker 1: Mmmm, it's been a while, but yeah, sort of.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's I mean, it's really good. I've seen it.
Speaker 2: I think just a couple of times, but the second
Speaker 2: time I saw it was not too long ago. But Chuck,
Speaker 2: please please watch Saint Maud. As far as a twenty
Speaker 2: four horror movies go, that's one of the more overlooked ones.
Speaker 2: It is off the chain. It's so good and it's
Speaker 2: just so nuts. Man.
Speaker 1: Uh, why have I heard of that?
Speaker 2: Is that I've told you to watch this before? I think, yeah,
Speaker 2: And I don't think you watched it, because you would
Speaker 2: have definitely come back and been like.
Speaker 1: Dude, okay, Saint Lawed. That's all I need to say. Okay, dude. Yeah,
Speaker 1: Well it's a British org. I'm all about those.
Speaker 2: It's good. There's it's rough though, like this is not
Speaker 2: for kids, and there's you know, really upsetting stuff throughout.
Speaker 1: So just FYI, all right, So back to screaming. Obviously, rage, fear, pain.
Speaker 1: These are alarm screams. The non alarm screams, Like we
Speaker 1: talked about, the joy, intense pleasure. I don't think I'll
Speaker 1: throw sadness in there, because that can be alarm. But
Speaker 1: those aren't things that you will find in the animal Kingdom.
Speaker 1: It is a distinctly uniquely human instinct to signal something
Speaker 1: positive with the scream. Animals don't scream out in joy.
Speaker 2: No, but we do think that some non human primates
Speaker 2: scream out in grief though. Isn't that awful?
Speaker 1: Oh man, Yeah, I.
Speaker 2: Think that's a great way to end this section and
Speaker 2: start with the ad break. What do you think?
Speaker 1: Yeah, let's do it and things all right, So back
Speaker 1: to screaming. I was I was afraid you're gonna scream.
Speaker 2: At one point.
Speaker 1: Not something we're gonna do. I can't remember the last
Speaker 1: time I tried to scream. Yeah, like just like as
Speaker 1: a like, Hey, what's your scream sound like at a
Speaker 1: party or something? You know, that old party trick? And
Speaker 1: I wonder, like I always think of, like the best
Speaker 1: scream I've ever heard is probably from American movie, the
Speaker 1: documentary you saw that, right, No, the American movie. It
Speaker 1: was about the the guys in Wisconsin making the low
Speaker 1: budget horror movie. That's why I would say Covin because
Speaker 1: he pronounced it covin.
Speaker 2: I never saw that. I know what you're talking about
Speaker 2: is worth seeing.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Oh, it's one of the great great documentaries of
Speaker 1: all time. Highly recommend it. But Mike Shank rest in peace,
Speaker 1: Mike has leftist very sadly. There's one part in there
Speaker 1: where the main guy is trying to record screams for
Speaker 1: his low budget horror film he's making in the studio,
Speaker 1: and Mike shank was this very very low key friend
Speaker 1: of his out of nowhere else send you the clip
Speaker 1: produces the most blood curdling scream I've ever heard in
Speaker 1: my life. It's incredible, definitely, and one of the funnier
Speaker 1: parts of that too, because nobody saw it coming, including
Speaker 1: his friend, and his reaction is great and it's just
Speaker 1: one of the great parts of that movie.
Speaker 2: Well, me and everybody listening will definitely see it coming. Now.
Speaker 1: Oh it's yeah, I guess that is a little bit spoiler,
Speaker 1: but it's a twenty year old documentary.
Speaker 2: So all right, I'll watch it though.
Speaker 1: Okay, if you watch t Et goes Home to everybody.
Speaker 2: Okay. So there's a name that's been kind of bestowed
Speaker 2: on some actresses over the years, which is scream Queen.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I always associate that with Jamie Lee Curtis, who got
Speaker 2: that from Halloween and prom Night. It actually dates back
Speaker 2: like fifty plus years before Halloween with Fay Ray when
Speaker 2: she was in King Kong. In nineteen thirty three. Apparently
Speaker 2: I've not seen the original King Kong, but her screams
Speaker 2: are supposedly really terrifying, and they did them all in
Speaker 2: post production, like apparently American movie, and then they mixed
Speaker 2: them together to just make them as disturbing as possible.
Speaker 2: But Fay Ray, the nineteen thirties actress, was the original
Speaker 2: scream queen.
Speaker 1: That's right. It's a pretty good screw. Not nearly as
Speaker 1: chilling as Mike Shanks, but it was nineteen thirty three.
Speaker 1: They did a pretty good job. You usually associate it
Speaker 1: with like a scream queen, like you know, it's usually
Speaker 1: a woman screaming in a horror movie. That's just sort
Speaker 1: of the trope. But there have been some notable man screams.
Speaker 1: James concert Lam mentioned earlier from Misery, but another that
Speaker 1: was done in post production, but it is so great.
Speaker 1: You should just check out this clip on YouTube. Is
Speaker 1: that the chilling ending of Invasion of the Body Snatchers
Speaker 1: from nineteen seventy eight with Donald Sutherland. And you know
Speaker 1: who was in charge of that scream? My friend, you
Speaker 1: probably looked this up, but it's our old pal from
Speaker 1: Star Wars, oh, who was hitting that high tension wire
Speaker 1: with a wrench. Ben Burt.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he was just a legend, wasn't he.
Speaker 1: Yeah, apparently this was layering pig squeals on top of
Speaker 1: each other. And it's a sort of a classic ending
Speaker 1: to that movie because that is the same that the
Speaker 1: pod people make when they see a human. And well,
Speaker 1: I mean, I guess this is all spoiler stuff, but
Speaker 1: it's from nineteen seventy eight. Donald Sutherland makes that sound
Speaker 1: at the end when he sees a human, indicating chillingly
Speaker 1: that he is now a pod person.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so keep an eye on Donald Sutherland when you
Speaker 2: watch that movie for the first time.
Speaker 1: Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 2: There's a couple others. Thomas Jane gives a really terrible
Speaker 2: scream at the end of The Mist, which has one
Speaker 2: of the unsettling endings I think of any movie ever,
Speaker 2: maybe tied with it Comes in the Night, which is
Speaker 2: another really unsettling a twenty four movie. Bruce Campbell he's
Speaker 2: a great man, screamer, I guess, scream king.
Speaker 1: He does everything great and then justin.
Speaker 2: Long He's definitely he's been in like way more horror
Speaker 2: movies than you would think, but he I'm pretty sure
Speaker 2: he screams pretty well in Barbarian Man. And then also
Speaker 2: I can't help but bring up since I mentioned Justin Long,
Speaker 2: He's in a new movie called Coyotes, which is a
Speaker 2: horror comedy about coyotes going on a rampage. And it
Speaker 2: just so happens that my niece, Mela Harris is in
Speaker 2: that movie too. She plays his and Kate Bosworth's daughter.
Speaker 1: Oh that's great. I love that. The odd connection of
Speaker 1: Justin Long and Hodgman. Of course with the mac Apple
Speaker 1: commercials for sure. When I was out in New York
Speaker 1: that time, after hanging out with Hodgman, you and I
Speaker 1: think went to a thing with him. Then later that
Speaker 1: night I saw Justin Long out, Oh weird, and I
Speaker 1: had to say something to him. I was like, you know,
Speaker 1: John's a friend of mine. I was just hanging out
Speaker 1: with him. It's funny that I saw you. And he said, well, Mela,
Speaker 1: Josh's future niece is right behind me.
Speaker 2: That's awesome.
Speaker 1: It was very funny.
Speaker 2: Thanks for a circling back like though. That was really
Speaker 2: kind of course.
Speaker 1: And then you know we have to also give a
Speaker 1: do to the a couple more scream queens. Very famously
Speaker 1: Janet Lee and Psycho and you got to talk about
Speaker 1: Nev Campbell in the movie Scream.
Speaker 2: Yes, And I would make an assertion that Mia Goth
Speaker 2: is the current Scream queen from the Maxazine trilogy.
Speaker 1: I think she's great.
Speaker 2: He's the one killing it right now.
Speaker 1: Yeah, she's awesome. And speaking of Scream, and I'm only
Speaker 1: plugging an old movie crush because guest Nate Bargetzi is
Speaker 1: now the biggest comedian on planet Earth.
Speaker 2: I know it's so great.
Speaker 1: But I had Nate on because I was a fan
Speaker 1: of Nate's very early on and I just wanted to
Speaker 1: meet Nate. So I drove to Nashville and had Nate on,
Speaker 1: and his movie crush pick was Scream.
Speaker 2: Did he know you were coming?
Speaker 1: Yeah? I took cornered him in a studio and he's like,
Speaker 1: who's this guy?
Speaker 2: He's such a good guy too, man, It's like his
Speaker 2: comedy's perfect, like he's it's I'm just really happy that
Speaker 2: he's so huge now.
Speaker 1: He's a great guy and super super nice in person,
Speaker 1: and I'm sure he is still that way even now
Speaker 1: that he's super famous. He seems like he's still a
Speaker 1: great guy. But Nate was very charming guests, So you
Speaker 1: can if you want to. If you're a big fan
Speaker 1: of Nate's now and you want to hear him talk
Speaker 1: to me, you can check out that old movie crush.
Speaker 2: Don't just check out that old movie crush, check out
Speaker 2: all the movie crushes because they are all priceless gems.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I definitely missed that show, but you know, some
Speaker 1: things just have to be retired eventually.
Speaker 2: Exactly, Chuck, So did you mention death metal? I thought
Speaker 2: you did.
Speaker 1: I don't think so, but that's obviously a place where
Speaker 1: screaming can be a profession in a way.
Speaker 2: So yeah, So, the University of Utah conducted these tests
Speaker 2: where they took dynamic MRI, so like you don't have
Speaker 2: to just be laying down still to get an MRI
Speaker 2: image of a person. They took MRIs of a guy
Speaker 2: named Will Ramos who's a death core singer for a
Speaker 2: band called Lorna Shore, and he is extraordinarily talented. Whether
Speaker 2: you like death core or can't stand death cores, go
Speaker 2: look up to the hell Fire the Lorna Shore video
Speaker 2: and his range of the work he does with screaming,
Speaker 2: like death core screaming is you can't help but be impressed.
Speaker 2: He's really good, right, so they got a really good
Speaker 2: person to study, because not only is he really good
Speaker 2: at screaming deathcore wise or death metal wise, his vocal junk,
Speaker 2: his neck junk is like entirely intact, like it's really healthy.
Speaker 2: He's been doing this for years and he hasn't done
Speaker 2: any damage. So these University of Utah researchers are like,
Speaker 2: what are you doing? Can we take MRIs of you singing?
Speaker 2: And they did, and it's really cool because the one
Speaker 2: of him just singing normally, you can barely see any
Speaker 2: movement inside the neck. Right when he screams, it just
Speaker 2: is chaos in there. And apparently people who know what
Speaker 2: the anatomy is can look at him and be like,
Speaker 2: oh my god, he's doing this and this is how
Speaker 2: he's keeping from ruining his vocal cords. So they actually
Speaker 2: got pretty far with it. But it's worth checking out
Speaker 2: that article because just for the MRIs side by side amazing.
Speaker 1: I thought, so yeah, and you know, it sounds like
Speaker 1: he has something special going on in his neck junk,
Speaker 1: because screaming can definitely like it's very hard on your throat.
Speaker 1: So good for him. He found his calling.
Speaker 2: He found his niche he got him where he fought in.
Speaker 1: That's right. Another reason to scream kind of here is
Speaker 1: where finishing up is pain control. They did a pretty
Speaker 1: interesting survey in twenty twenty of children that had been
Speaker 1: in the hospital and pain like screaming to relieve pain control.
Speaker 1: It turns out is probably a thing I haven't seen
Speaker 1: like the most robust scientific study, but at least from
Speaker 1: this survey, children routinely described feeling a feeling of liberation
Speaker 1: when they screamed, and then a feeling of calmness afterward
Speaker 1: that helped them experience pain in a more manageable way.
Speaker 1: The problem is is that adults and doctors and nurses
Speaker 1: can't take it. Obviously, parents, it's going to be very
Speaker 1: disturbing because they're going to try and get their kid
Speaker 1: to not scream, and the same goes for doctors and
Speaker 1: nurses trying to comfort them. But the status quote of
Speaker 1: all it seems like it helped them. In an eight
Speaker 1: year old noted, maybe it's good to scream, but they
Speaker 1: don't know that. Nobody asks me, my god.
Speaker 2: I know it said it's awful. The reason why they
Speaker 2: think that it does help with pain relief is because
Speaker 2: one of the hormones or one of the chemicals released
Speaker 2: in the fight or flight response is are endorphins, which
Speaker 2: can dull pain. So it does make sense that screaming
Speaker 2: could help you with pain. There's another clever use of screaming,
Speaker 2: if you ask me, then screaming in the emergency room,
Speaker 2: which is replacing the current paradigm for creating anxiety inside
Speaker 2: a lab to study anxiety for research, which is to
Speaker 2: threaten people with a shock. And they've actually found that
Speaker 2: you can threaten people that with a scream and generate
Speaker 2: anxiety just as reliably. So people are like, we should
Speaker 2: stop threatening people with shocks because it's unethical and just
Speaker 2: start saying somebody's gonna scream in a second or maybe
Speaker 2: two seconds. You're never going to know, and that can
Speaker 2: generate anxiety as well.
Speaker 1: But you know, we're so soft. Before long, they're gonna
Speaker 1: be like, you can't scream with people either, right.
Speaker 2: They'll be like, we want you to feel anxiety right now.
Speaker 1: Please, yeah, and would you do that for.
Speaker 2: I'm sure the participant would be like, I feel anxiety
Speaker 2: all the time, can do right?
Speaker 1: Then? I guess finally we should at least mention scream
Speaker 1: therapy or primal scream therapy. I feel like we talked
Speaker 1: about this at a certain point, but this has been
Speaker 1: around since the sixties. I felt like it was probably biggest,
Speaker 1: maybe in the late sixties and seventies. The original primal
Speaker 1: scream therapy psychologist was Arthur Janoff and this was based
Speaker 1: on the idea that like we all have this repressed
Speaker 1: trauma from childhood, it's stored as primal pain. And Arthur
Speaker 1: Janell said, well, you know what, a good old fashion
Speaker 1: screaming session can release that stuff and get it out there.
Speaker 1: The bad news is it turns out there's not a
Speaker 1: lot of evidence that supports it as being a credible
Speaker 1: form of therapy.
Speaker 2: No, and actually I think it's possible it can hurt
Speaker 2: in trauma therapy because screaming can arouse anxiety in the
Speaker 2: person screaming even too, so not necessarily the best thing
Speaker 2: to do.
Speaker 1: No, but very sixty seventies I could see that being
Speaker 1: a thing.
Speaker 2: Super There's like one of those wicker chairs that people
Speaker 2: used to take prom pictures in one of the wicker throne.
Speaker 2: There's definitely one of those in the office.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think Black Moses album cover wasn't Isaac Kay's
Speaker 1: in one of.
Speaker 2: Those, I believe, So, yeah, was there like a panther
Speaker 2: laying at his feet too?
Speaker 1: Probably there should have been.
Speaker 2: Okay, Well, obviously, since we started talking about Isaac Hayes,
Speaker 2: I think we've just unlicked listener mail.
Speaker 1: Chuck, that's right, and I am wrong actually, because of
Speaker 1: course the Black Moses album cover was just that great
Speaker 1: picture of Isaac Kay's with the shades on and wearing
Speaker 1: that sort of striped colored hood. But maybe it was
Speaker 1: on the back. I definitely have seen Isaa Kays in
Speaker 1: a wicker throne.
Speaker 2: Here, Joe.
Speaker 1: Maybe it was Escape from New York. All right, guys,
Speaker 1: this is Leslie. All right, guys. I don't remember how
Speaker 1: I was turned onto your podcast, but I've been a
Speaker 1: regular listener for several years now, and finally I'm getting
Speaker 1: around to writing. Often. Wish I was in the studio
Speaker 1: during her recording so I could comment or applaud hey
Speaker 1: like I did today. Yeah. I was sad to learn
Speaker 1: that you weren't doing San Francisco's Sketch Fest this year,
Speaker 1: but I'm hoping you come back next year. My friend
Speaker 1: Christina and I will be there. I wanted to write
Speaker 1: when the topic was animal communication because the musical interlude
Speaker 1: was an homage to the Beach Boys Pet Sounds, which
Speaker 1: was brilliant. You thank Jerry for that. By the way,
Speaker 1: I work in animal care, you see, so I love
Speaker 1: your animal episodes. I appreciate how you guys accept a
Speaker 1: correction showing up. It's okay to make a mistake as
Speaker 1: long as you learn from it. And I appreciate how
Speaker 1: you present important yet sensitive topics in a respectful way,
Speaker 1: or how you share multiple points of view on divisive issues.
Speaker 1: I just want to thank you for keeping me company
Speaker 1: during my commute, explaining complex things, making seemingly unsavory topics palatable,
Speaker 1: entertain me, educating me, and more ps in support of
Speaker 1: your efforts to grow your listenership. Still, I shared your
Speaker 1: Sesame Street episode on my Facebook page, so Leslie really
Speaker 1: appreciate that. Yeah, and then there's a PPS. I've often
Speaker 1: thought a good drinking game could be to drink every
Speaker 1: time Chuck says that's right, roll off the tongue or
Speaker 1: for sure for sure. But I don't drink alcohol, so
Speaker 1: if I were to play, I'd probably just get really
Speaker 1: well hydrated. It's very funny, Leslie s in the San
Speaker 1: Francisco Bay area. And yeah, Leslie, we'd love to see
Speaker 1: you at our show next year because hopefully we'll be there.
Speaker 2: That was really really sweet when a very nice email, Leslie,
Speaker 2: thank you for taking the time to write all that,
Speaker 2: and thank you for sharing our Sysame Street episode. That's
Speaker 2: a pretty good one to share. If you ask me,
Speaker 2: and if you want to be like Leslie and send
Speaker 2: us a very nice email. We always love getting those.
Speaker 2: You can send it off to stuff podcast at iHeartRadio
Speaker 2: dot com.
Speaker 1: Stuff you Should Know is a production of iHeartRadio. For
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