From a whisper to a scream

The record begins with a vintage snippet of Christian spoken word followed by a needle scratching, a gun cocking and a blast of discordant guitar topped with Bert McCracken’s throaty scream.

A sarcastic nod to the band’s shared history growing up in Mormon country, the kickoff to the Used’s latest record isn’t likely to win the group many friends in the church, but that’s OK. The Utah quartet has made plenty of converts since bursting on the scene two years ago with their million-selling debut.

That fan base is likely to grow with their recently released follow-up, “In Love and Death,” an album that adds significant fuel to the growing fire of “screamo” -- a burgeoning genre that plays loud against soft in songs that are half-sung, half-screamed.

Penned by McCracken, a charismatic singer with a Charlie Manson smirk, the songs lace orchestral strings with sludgy guitars, Fisher-Price toys with tribal beats, maniacal laughter and heartfelt lyrics, gut-busting guitars and twinkling piano. Lyrically, the emotional bloodletting is as hopeful as it is nihilistic, with nods to the Beatles as well as to hard-core contemporaries such as My Chemical Romance.

Two weeks into writing the new album, McCracken’s dog, David Bowie, was struck by a car and died. Two weeks before finishing, his former girlfriend of five years died, and his work on the album is dedicated to her.

“I kind of wanted to open it up a little bit more this time and kind of expose a little bit more of my vulnerable side,” said McCracken, 22, the youngest and most volatile member of the group. “The most important thing for me was to share exactly how I felt because I’m sure there are thousands and thousands of people who can relate.”

McCracken is as well known for his highly publicized but short-lived romance with Kelly Osbourne -- a relationship that reportedly began when Osbourne mistook McCracken for a roadie at an Ozzfest show in 2003 and ended two months later on Valentine’s Day. Try to clarify things with McCracken, however, and he feigns a hearing problem.

“Kelly Clarkson?” he deadpanned. “I don’t know Kelly Clarkson.”

Accompanied by Branden Steineckert on drums, Quinn Allman on guitar and Jepha Howard on bass, McCracken is the clear favorite among fans who are both impressed and amused by the singer’s mischievous nature and reckless abandon.

Early in the band’s career, McCracken often screamed so hard he threw up on stage. Today, he regularly climbs to the tops of speaker stacks and dives into the crowd. And he drinks -- sometimes heavily -- despite dire warnings from doctors who diagnosed him with pancreatitis this year.

The Used’s resident crazy-maker, he is also the band’s driving creative force -- an unpredictable contrarian whose personality affects the group “in a super huge good way, and sometimes in a negative way,” said McCracken, a former choir boy who was raised a Mormon and left the church at age 15 to dabble in Catholicism, then Hare Krishna, then drugs and rock ‘n’ roll. “I’m very obnoxious at times, I guess, and at the same time it totally creates a beautiful tension with the other personalities.”

It was McCracken, after all, who solidified a lineup that came together in pieces, beginning in the late ‘90s with the rhythm section, then Allman 1 1/2 years later and finally McCracken.

Three years ago, before screamo was all the rage -- or had even been coined as a phrase -- live shows were difficult to come by in the Used’s hometown of Orem.

According to McCracken, it was a combination of there being “nowhere to play, and then we’d find a place to play and after a show they’d ask us please to never come back here again.”

The group doesn’t have that problem these days. In the two years after their debut, the group played 600-plus shows, including stints with Ozzfest, the Vans Warped Tour and, this past summer, Linkin Park’s Projekt Revolution Tour. The group’s tour in support of “In Love and Death” kicked off last weekend and stops in L.A. tonight at the Wiltern LG.

Now when he’s back in Orem, “I get a lot of double looks, but I don’t get tackled on the street or anything. There aren’t mobs of people following me around,” McCracken said. “I definitely do stay out of the mall when I’m here just because sometimes people think I’m trying to draw attention to myself when I’m shopping for socks.”

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The Used

When: 7 tonight

Where: The Wiltern LG, 3790 Wilshire Blvd., L.A.

Cost: $20

Info: (213) 388-1400 or www.thewiltern.com