missed yesterday...so you get two today. i'm overworked and stressing out, so i've got two songs about that.
"Work Song" by Caroline's Spine: [excuse the weird anime sounds at the beginning. it's the only complete recording of the song on youtube...so if you stick it out through the first five seconds, the song will start.]
"Take This Job and Shove It", as covered by the Dead Kennedys:
Showing posts with label nineties. Show all posts
Showing posts with label nineties. Show all posts
3.24.2008
Quite Suppressed Yet Quite Revealing: Monday, March 24
during my senior year of high school, i listened to "Loser" by Three Doors Down every morning when i was getting ready for the day. it's a perfect encapsulation of how i felt about life that year...high school was a vast, friendless wasteland, and everyone was watching, holding the rope while i took the fall. i hadn't realised yet that college would be the closest thing to a magic panacea that i'd ever had. i hadn't realised yet that i'd eventually have a fulfilling social life. this song conveyed hopelessness, and every morning i luxuriated in it, knowing that at least Three Doors Down knew where i was coming from, even if no one else did.
3.19.2008
Quite Suppressed Yet Quite Revealing: Wednesday, March 19
i love Emmet Swimming. they're a nineties alt-rock band out of the Washington, DC area, and it always confused me that they never made it bigger than they did. their album Big Night Without You was one of my favourites in high school, and i still listen to it frequently ten years hence. "Fist Like A Glove" by Emmet Swimming is one of my favourite tracks on the album. it's a gorgeous song...although really sad; the lyrics are a thoughtful treatment of domestic violence. that's something Emmet Swimming is really good at, taking modern issues and turning them into heart-wrenching musical pictures.
3.18.2008
Quite Suppressed Yet Quite Revealing: Tuesday, March 18
it's guilty pleasure time! i can't really explain why i like "Youth of the Nation" by P.O.D. so much...but i do. it's catchy. that's about all it has to redeem such a trite little piece of late-nineties nostalgia, but sometimes catchy is enough.
3.10.2008
you've got questions? Supergig's got answers.
i found a list of questions about music on another blog...it was a long time ago, so i don't remember which one it was. however, i liked a lot of the questions. they prompted me to start musing about various songs and artists. so, i answered them.
1. Which bands/artist do you own the most albums by?
i own 17 Wesley Willis albums. that is my biggest music-collecting goal...to own all of Wesley's albums. i've been working on this for about seven years now, ever since the spring of my first year of college. it's not a likely goal to achieve, since many of his albums were self-released and there doesn't even exist a comprehensive list of all of the albums he recorded. but, i want to try. Wesley is one of my favourite musicians ever, and every album of his that i find contains more amusing, entertaining gems.
2. What was the last song you listened to?
"Dissent" by Linoleum. i just heard it for the first time, and it's a really good song. it's somewhere between alt-rock and indie-rock on that ever-so-nebulous continuum, but we know how worthless those kinds of descriptions are. the lead singer's voice is shiny.
3. What's in your CD player right now?
i don't own a CD player anymore. my last one broke back in 2005, and i have depended on my computer and my iPod for my music-listening needs ever since.
4. What was the last show you attended?
Theory of God, Once Afflicted, and Slugtrail at the Creepy Crawl on February 2nd. it was a show i went to because i wasn't doing anything else that night, and needed to get out of the apartment. i didn't know any of the bands who were playing, but decided a local metal show was just what i needed. i try to write about all the shows i go to here, but there really wasn't enough to say about that show to fill up a blog post. Theory of God was good...solid, instrumental heavy metal. i wish they had a website that was in any way useful, so i could figure out when they were playing in town next...or even how to contact a band member so they could tell me when they were playing in town next. however, Once Afflicted and Slugtrail were both awful. Once Afflicted sounded like a bad Godsmack knockoff come ten years late. Slugtrail? i don't know quite what i was listening to, but i wasn't sure it was music. i've done a lot to put it out of my head in the last two weeks, and i'm not about to google them in order to put it back in my head to give you a better description. i love you, my dear readers, but not enough to listen to them again. you can google them if you want, but be warned. your ears may rebel against you.
5. What was the greatest show you've ever been to?
Cold, Finger Eleven, and Reach 454 at the Metro, on May 25, 2003. okay, so Reach 454 was terrible, but Cold and Finger Eleven were then, and still are, my favourite bands on earth. they both put on such passionate shows...as good as they are recorded, the energy is just so much more when they play live. they also both sounded great...it makes me so happy when bands i love sound good live, because it means they don't need all that slick record production to sound like the band i feel like i know and love. the Metro is also my favourite venue in Chicago. it's big enough to get some good crowd action going, but still not so large that i feel detached from the band on stage.
6. What's the worst show you've ever been to?
see #4. i've never been to a show where every band was awful. but, at that show, it was only Theory of God, who was on stage for a whole twenty minutes, who was good. the two bands that got more stage time, Once Afflicted and Slugtrail, were unlistenably bad. it was the only show i've ever left early because the music was so bad. and, to add insult to injury, my friend and i got mugged on the way back to the car after the show. sigh.
7. What show are you looking forward to?
i've got a few coming up...but the one i'm most looking forward to is Brian Vander Ark. [does that really surprise you, on a blog named after a Verve Pipe song?! didn't think so...] he's coming to Wash U and playing a show on campus on March 31. his solo music is mellower than the stuff he did with The Verve Pipe, but is still very good. the venue is small and intimate, which will be nice. i just really hope he plays my two favourite songs of his: "Didn't Want To Be A Bother" [a sarcastic song about people who try to push religion on others] and "1229 Sheffield" [a Verve Pipe song he reworked as a solo piece...a really melancholy song about a young marriage gone terribly wrong].
8. What is your favorite band shirt?
my Slitheryn shirt. Slitheryn was a local band in Chicago for a few years in the early aughts. they were weird...a heavy metal band in which all the instrumentalists were thirteen years old, and the lead singer was eleven. they were together for a while...until the instrumentalists were maybe fifteen or sixteen, and the singer thirteen or fourteen. they weren't a great band, but they were extremely good for their ages, and have promising things ahead of them if they want to stick with the music thing. anyway, the shirt i bought when i saw them in 2001 is fantastic. it is a black shirt. it says "Slitheryn" on the front. on the back, it has a picture of the band, and the text "DITCHES SCHOOL." i love the fact that the most bad-ass thing they could think of to brag about was that they ditch school.
9. What musician would you like to hang out with for a day?
James Black from Finger Eleven. not only does his band make really good music, but he makes really weird art and poetry as well. he'd be an extremely interesting person to hang out with for a day. i think we'd have some very strange conversations, and i'd enjoy that.
10. Who is one musician or group you wish would make a comeback?
i always hate to answer this question. whenever bands get together and make "comebacks," it never seems to be quite as good as the original music. i always allow myself to get optimistic, and then i'm always disappointed with the results. however, if i were to allow myself to hope a band would get back together and be as good as they were, it would definitely be Cold. they waffled between together and broken-up for a while, and finally broke up for good in November of 2006. they released four albums during the time they were together, all of which were fantastic. they're still one of my favourite bands of all time, and it makes me sad that i will never get to hear them live again, or listen to a new album of theirs.
11. Who is one band/artist you've never seen live but always wanted to?
Wesley Willis. i know i never will, because he died in 2003...but i always wanted to, and never did. his live shows were probably completely weird: him, playing his keyboard, improvising even weirder lyrics to his already-weird songs. he also usually played the Fireside Bowl, which was a fantastic venue. the Fireside used to be a bowling alley, but when it got too old and decrepit to be functional for bowling, they started hosting underground music shows there. i've been to a couple shows there, although never Wesley. it would have been perfect to see the goofiest musician in Chicago play at the goofiest venue in Chicago.
12. Name four or more flawless albums:
flawless albums? that's hard. almost all of the albums i've ever listened to, owned, or even loved have had a flaw on it. even the best albums have that one song that isn't quite up to par. however, there are a few albums i know that don't have even That One Inevitable Clunker on it...and can thus be described as flawless:
only one. i'm not a big DVD watcher, so even if it's a band i like i never buy the concert DVDs. i'd prefer to just buy a ticket when the band comes through town and see them live. the only music-related DVD i have is The Daddy of Rock and Roll, a documentary made about Wesley Willis a few years ago. it has a little bit of concert footage, although most of it is a portrait of his life. there's actually another documentary out about Wesley, one that came out just this year: Wesley Willis Joyrides. it's still making the festival circuit. i hope it plays here, although it's not likely because the Saint Louis Film Festival is held in November. it's not out on DVD yet, but i'm sure i'll buy it when it does come out. Wesley is fascinating, and i've heard very good things about Joyrides.
14. How many concerts/shows have you been to, total?
i have lost count. i used to know how many i had been to, back when i was in high school. i wasn't able to go to very many back then. but, once i moved out of the house and up to Chicago, i started going to a lot more shows and lost count. in Raleigh, concertgoing was a rare occurrence. in Chicago, it became my life. it became the norm. instead of buying tickets for every show weeks [and sometimes months] in advance, i had the luxury of being able to go see a random local band on almost any given night if i didn't have anything else to do.
15. Who have you seen the most live?
i have seen Inept sixteen times. they're a local band from the Chicago area, and played in the city and the near suburbs a lot. i'm not as crazy about their recent stuff, but their first few releases back in 2003 and 2004 were fantastic. the shows were a lot of fun; they had a lot of devoted fans who jump, mosh, and sing every word. then again, i'm sure they still do...i don't know all the words to their newer songs, but i still know the old stuff like the back of my hand, and miss the days when those songs were the bread and butter of their shows.
16. What is your favorite movie soundtrack?
that's an easy one: Daredevil. i don't know who was in charge of putting together the soundtrack for that movie, but they had to have been reading my mind. otherwise, how would they have known to put so many bands i love on there? Fuel, Seether, Finger Eleven, Drowning Pool. it was paradise! furthermore, i discovered several bands who i grew to love after hearing them on this soundtrack: Revis, Evanescence, and Boysetsfire. i would never have picked it up if it didn't have so many bands i already knew and loved, although the strongest tracks on the album are the ones by these new bands who i had not heard of before then. i've never seen the movie; i'm not a big movie watcher and i kept hearing that it was terrible. but, the album is solid evidence that Wind-Up Records should be doing a lot more movie soundtracks.
17. What was your last musical "phase" before you wisened up?
my musical tastes have been building upon each other since i was 14, and first got into modern rock. before that, though...wow, it's embarrassing. the cool station to listen to when i was in middle school was Mix 101.5: the adult contemporary station. so, that's the kind of stuff i listened to in a futile attempt to have something in common with my classmates. it didn't help me; i still had no friends then. but, i had a voracious taste for anything Celine Dion would put out. that should count for something, no?
28. What's your "guilty pleasure" that you hate to admit to liking?
where do i begin with this one? i'm usually really open with my ridiculous guilty pleasure songs. out of all the songs i feel bad for liking, the one i feel the worst for liking--and even worse for admitting i like--is "Rollin'" by Limp Bizkit. i know, i expounded here earlier upon the fact that there's no excuse for Limp Bizkit. i still don't think there is; this one fun guilty pleasure song of theirs is not worth all the musical havoc they wrought in the late nineties. but, still...if this comes on the radio or a jukebox, i start singing and dancing. i hate myself for it, but i can't help it.
1. Which bands/artist do you own the most albums by?
i own 17 Wesley Willis albums. that is my biggest music-collecting goal...to own all of Wesley's albums. i've been working on this for about seven years now, ever since the spring of my first year of college. it's not a likely goal to achieve, since many of his albums were self-released and there doesn't even exist a comprehensive list of all of the albums he recorded. but, i want to try. Wesley is one of my favourite musicians ever, and every album of his that i find contains more amusing, entertaining gems.
2. What was the last song you listened to?
"Dissent" by Linoleum. i just heard it for the first time, and it's a really good song. it's somewhere between alt-rock and indie-rock on that ever-so-nebulous continuum, but we know how worthless those kinds of descriptions are. the lead singer's voice is shiny.
3. What's in your CD player right now?
i don't own a CD player anymore. my last one broke back in 2005, and i have depended on my computer and my iPod for my music-listening needs ever since.
4. What was the last show you attended?
Theory of God, Once Afflicted, and Slugtrail at the Creepy Crawl on February 2nd. it was a show i went to because i wasn't doing anything else that night, and needed to get out of the apartment. i didn't know any of the bands who were playing, but decided a local metal show was just what i needed. i try to write about all the shows i go to here, but there really wasn't enough to say about that show to fill up a blog post. Theory of God was good...solid, instrumental heavy metal. i wish they had a website that was in any way useful, so i could figure out when they were playing in town next...or even how to contact a band member so they could tell me when they were playing in town next. however, Once Afflicted and Slugtrail were both awful. Once Afflicted sounded like a bad Godsmack knockoff come ten years late. Slugtrail? i don't know quite what i was listening to, but i wasn't sure it was music. i've done a lot to put it out of my head in the last two weeks, and i'm not about to google them in order to put it back in my head to give you a better description. i love you, my dear readers, but not enough to listen to them again. you can google them if you want, but be warned. your ears may rebel against you.
5. What was the greatest show you've ever been to?
Cold, Finger Eleven, and Reach 454 at the Metro, on May 25, 2003. okay, so Reach 454 was terrible, but Cold and Finger Eleven were then, and still are, my favourite bands on earth. they both put on such passionate shows...as good as they are recorded, the energy is just so much more when they play live. they also both sounded great...it makes me so happy when bands i love sound good live, because it means they don't need all that slick record production to sound like the band i feel like i know and love. the Metro is also my favourite venue in Chicago. it's big enough to get some good crowd action going, but still not so large that i feel detached from the band on stage.
6. What's the worst show you've ever been to?
see #4. i've never been to a show where every band was awful. but, at that show, it was only Theory of God, who was on stage for a whole twenty minutes, who was good. the two bands that got more stage time, Once Afflicted and Slugtrail, were unlistenably bad. it was the only show i've ever left early because the music was so bad. and, to add insult to injury, my friend and i got mugged on the way back to the car after the show. sigh.
7. What show are you looking forward to?
i've got a few coming up...but the one i'm most looking forward to is Brian Vander Ark. [does that really surprise you, on a blog named after a Verve Pipe song?! didn't think so...] he's coming to Wash U and playing a show on campus on March 31. his solo music is mellower than the stuff he did with The Verve Pipe, but is still very good. the venue is small and intimate, which will be nice. i just really hope he plays my two favourite songs of his: "Didn't Want To Be A Bother" [a sarcastic song about people who try to push religion on others] and "1229 Sheffield" [a Verve Pipe song he reworked as a solo piece...a really melancholy song about a young marriage gone terribly wrong].
8. What is your favorite band shirt?
my Slitheryn shirt. Slitheryn was a local band in Chicago for a few years in the early aughts. they were weird...a heavy metal band in which all the instrumentalists were thirteen years old, and the lead singer was eleven. they were together for a while...until the instrumentalists were maybe fifteen or sixteen, and the singer thirteen or fourteen. they weren't a great band, but they were extremely good for their ages, and have promising things ahead of them if they want to stick with the music thing. anyway, the shirt i bought when i saw them in 2001 is fantastic. it is a black shirt. it says "Slitheryn" on the front. on the back, it has a picture of the band, and the text "DITCHES SCHOOL." i love the fact that the most bad-ass thing they could think of to brag about was that they ditch school.
9. What musician would you like to hang out with for a day?
James Black from Finger Eleven. not only does his band make really good music, but he makes really weird art and poetry as well. he'd be an extremely interesting person to hang out with for a day. i think we'd have some very strange conversations, and i'd enjoy that.
10. Who is one musician or group you wish would make a comeback?
i always hate to answer this question. whenever bands get together and make "comebacks," it never seems to be quite as good as the original music. i always allow myself to get optimistic, and then i'm always disappointed with the results. however, if i were to allow myself to hope a band would get back together and be as good as they were, it would definitely be Cold. they waffled between together and broken-up for a while, and finally broke up for good in November of 2006. they released four albums during the time they were together, all of which were fantastic. they're still one of my favourite bands of all time, and it makes me sad that i will never get to hear them live again, or listen to a new album of theirs.
11. Who is one band/artist you've never seen live but always wanted to?
Wesley Willis. i know i never will, because he died in 2003...but i always wanted to, and never did. his live shows were probably completely weird: him, playing his keyboard, improvising even weirder lyrics to his already-weird songs. he also usually played the Fireside Bowl, which was a fantastic venue. the Fireside used to be a bowling alley, but when it got too old and decrepit to be functional for bowling, they started hosting underground music shows there. i've been to a couple shows there, although never Wesley. it would have been perfect to see the goofiest musician in Chicago play at the goofiest venue in Chicago.
12. Name four or more flawless albums:
flawless albums? that's hard. almost all of the albums i've ever listened to, owned, or even loved have had a flaw on it. even the best albums have that one song that isn't quite up to par. however, there are a few albums i know that don't have even That One Inevitable Clunker on it...and can thus be described as flawless:
- Secret Samadhi by Live.
- this album stands up to repeated listenings more than any other album i've ever experienced. it always confuses me why people always seem to prefer Throwing Copper to this one. Throwing Copper is good, yes, but the songs aren't as interesting, fun to listen to, or generally hard-rocking as the songs on Secret Samadhi. this album is Live at its best...and, possibly, nineties alternative rock at its best.
- Rush Hour by Wesley Willis.
- this album has some of Wesley's most deliciously weird music. Greatest Hits Volume 3 may be weirder, but it also has "Love God" on it--which is by far Wesley's worst song. Rush Hour is hilarious from beginning to end, with no songs worthy of being skipped. it has such gems as "The Termites Ate My House Up", which suggests the worst way ever of exterminating bugs [specifically, shooting up a house with a BB gun] and "King of Fire", which i am convinced is Wesley's weirdest song ever.
- Eve 6 by Eve 6.
- this album is just plain solid from beginning to end. the songs are all fun to listen to, and they're rife with the clever puns and wordplay that make Eve 6's lyrics so interesting. it's one part pop, two parts rock, thoroughly nineties...and made the summer after my sophomore year of high school extra-happy.
- Darkest Days by Stabbing Westward.
- this album is a concept album, designed to trace the arc of a relationship from being single to meeting someone to becoming infatuated with them, through the deterioration of the relationship and then finally getting over it. it's sixteen good songs put in the perfect order to tell a story. what makes it even better is that they maintain their dark character as Stabbing Westward...there's nothing sunny and sappy in the album. if there had been, it would feel out of place, even during the phase when the relationship described in the album is going well. the love song, "You Complete Me", straddles somewhere between "what did i do to get so lucky?" and "we're both screwed up, let's be screwed up together."
only one. i'm not a big DVD watcher, so even if it's a band i like i never buy the concert DVDs. i'd prefer to just buy a ticket when the band comes through town and see them live. the only music-related DVD i have is The Daddy of Rock and Roll, a documentary made about Wesley Willis a few years ago. it has a little bit of concert footage, although most of it is a portrait of his life. there's actually another documentary out about Wesley, one that came out just this year: Wesley Willis Joyrides. it's still making the festival circuit. i hope it plays here, although it's not likely because the Saint Louis Film Festival is held in November. it's not out on DVD yet, but i'm sure i'll buy it when it does come out. Wesley is fascinating, and i've heard very good things about Joyrides.
14. How many concerts/shows have you been to, total?
i have lost count. i used to know how many i had been to, back when i was in high school. i wasn't able to go to very many back then. but, once i moved out of the house and up to Chicago, i started going to a lot more shows and lost count. in Raleigh, concertgoing was a rare occurrence. in Chicago, it became my life. it became the norm. instead of buying tickets for every show weeks [and sometimes months] in advance, i had the luxury of being able to go see a random local band on almost any given night if i didn't have anything else to do.
15. Who have you seen the most live?
i have seen Inept sixteen times. they're a local band from the Chicago area, and played in the city and the near suburbs a lot. i'm not as crazy about their recent stuff, but their first few releases back in 2003 and 2004 were fantastic. the shows were a lot of fun; they had a lot of devoted fans who jump, mosh, and sing every word. then again, i'm sure they still do...i don't know all the words to their newer songs, but i still know the old stuff like the back of my hand, and miss the days when those songs were the bread and butter of their shows.
16. What is your favorite movie soundtrack?
that's an easy one: Daredevil. i don't know who was in charge of putting together the soundtrack for that movie, but they had to have been reading my mind. otherwise, how would they have known to put so many bands i love on there? Fuel, Seether, Finger Eleven, Drowning Pool. it was paradise! furthermore, i discovered several bands who i grew to love after hearing them on this soundtrack: Revis, Evanescence, and Boysetsfire. i would never have picked it up if it didn't have so many bands i already knew and loved, although the strongest tracks on the album are the ones by these new bands who i had not heard of before then. i've never seen the movie; i'm not a big movie watcher and i kept hearing that it was terrible. but, the album is solid evidence that Wind-Up Records should be doing a lot more movie soundtracks.
17. What was your last musical "phase" before you wisened up?
my musical tastes have been building upon each other since i was 14, and first got into modern rock. before that, though...wow, it's embarrassing. the cool station to listen to when i was in middle school was Mix 101.5: the adult contemporary station. so, that's the kind of stuff i listened to in a futile attempt to have something in common with my classmates. it didn't help me; i still had no friends then. but, i had a voracious taste for anything Celine Dion would put out. that should count for something, no?
28. What's your "guilty pleasure" that you hate to admit to liking?
where do i begin with this one? i'm usually really open with my ridiculous guilty pleasure songs. out of all the songs i feel bad for liking, the one i feel the worst for liking--and even worse for admitting i like--is "Rollin'" by Limp Bizkit. i know, i expounded here earlier upon the fact that there's no excuse for Limp Bizkit. i still don't think there is; this one fun guilty pleasure song of theirs is not worth all the musical havoc they wrought in the late nineties. but, still...if this comes on the radio or a jukebox, i start singing and dancing. i hate myself for it, but i can't help it.
3.05.2008
Quite Suppressed Yet Quite Revealing: Wednesday, March 5
rock over london. rock on chicago. Wesley Willis is awesome...and "Cut The Mullet" is one of his funniest songs. it's also practical advice for your everyday life. mullets are no good, and should be cut at the earliest convenience.
3.03.2008
Quite Suppressed Yet Quite Revealing: Monday, March 3
here, have another sweet, delicious taste of the nineties: "Not An Addict" by K's Choice. it's a bummer they didn't make it any bigger in the states; i never got to see them in concert before they broke up. this was the only song that got much play here. however, if they were going to have one song get popular, this was the song...they have a lot of solid tunes, but this has always been my favourite.
3.02.2008
Quite Suppressed Yet Quite Revealing: Sunday, March 2
Cold is one of my favourite bands of all time, and "Go Away" is one of my favourite songs of theirs. it's raw, it's angry, and it's Cold at its best.
2.29.2008
Quite Suppressed Yet Quite Revealing: Friday, February 29
i always loved "Tired" by Matchbox20. it was the B-Side to the "Push" single, and wondered why it never made it on to an album. the vocal lines during the verses are awesome...it's almost like he's rambling, but it's a little too rhythmic for that.
1.31.2008
in defense of nü metal
i have never seen anyone say anything positive about the genre of nü metal, as such. this has irked me for ten years. i've never heard people use the term "nü metal" as anything but pejorative, but there is some very good music that is popularly described as such.
people deride the music that falls under that umbrella as boring. meaningless. repetitive. dull. sure enough, there is a lot of subpar music that qualifies as nü metal. most people view Korn and Limp Bizkit as the standard bearers of the genre. Korn isn't my favourite band in the world. i always found them to be extremely boring, and many of their songs sounded the same. "Freak on a Leash" was a good tune, though...it was an apt anthem for a misunderstood teen, and i was a sixteen-year-old high school loner when the song came out. furthermore, they were one of the first bands to hit the mainstream with a detuned amalgam of rock, metal, rap, and funk. they weren't the best of the bunch, but i respect their role in beginning to clear out a place in the music scene for the genre...and even though they were usually boring, they never made me want to weep for humanity.
[as for Limp Bizkit...well, there's really no defense for Limp Bizkit. they were one of the worst bands of the nineties, if not the very worst. that's one point, probably the only point, on which the nü metal haters and i see eye to eye. their music sounds like party pop-rap with guitars.]
the term nü metal is a fairly vague one, to be sure...it started as almost a synonym for rap-rock, and then started to refer to bands who were in that same grey space between grunge and metal, but didn't necessarily have as many rap influences. by the early aughts, very few popular nü metal bands [save Linkin Park...] had or retained much rap styling at all. the term is less than specific...but none but the broadest terms for music have very fuzzy great areas, and i'm going to stick with the nomenclature because its spectrum is familiar to anyone who knows a bit about nineties music.
anyway...there was a lot of schlock promulgated under the umbrella of nü metal, and people bring that up to disparage every band with that handful of influences. but, the fact remains that there's a lot of schlock under any given musical label. just like wheat and chaff coexist under any musical label, there is good nü metal and bad nü metal. from here on out, we focus on the good; there are a lot of gems that people roll their eyes and dismiss because it happens to be nü metal. there are a lot of songs in that style that honestly portray emotion, that have compelling melodies, and prove that the flak that people give the genre as a whole is very often unwarranted.
Disturbed
their first album was full of rap influences which have faded away as time has gone by. although their first album, Down With The Sickness, remains their best to date, they still put out solid music and they're one of the few late nineties or very early aughts bands who remains recognizable, about as good as they were. my favourite song of theirs is "Remember"--it sets the mood of being fixated on something that happened in the past, and the melody haunts.
Drowning Pool
Drowning Pool is not the same band they were back in the early oughts. Dave Williams, their lead singer, died in the summer of 2002...that's the only time i've ever cried when a famous person has died. the new singer isn't nearly as good. his voice went from screaming to growling to singing so seamlessly, and Sinner rocked from start to finish. i'm sure you all know "Bodies" already...this is the video for "Tear Away," which is a little more like the rest of Sinner and a better song to boot.
Finger Eleven
Finger Eleven is one of my two favourite bands [the other being Cold]. even in their earliest music they never had much of a rap influence, but the grunge, metal, and funk influences pervade their music.1 [in fact, before they were Finger Eleven, they called themselves the Rainbow Butt Monkeys, and were more of a funk band than a rock band.] their first three albums were fantastic...really, the only dud on any of them was "One Thing." everything else, fast or slow, was good, solid rock--like this, their song "Quicksand" from their first album.
Linkin Park
i got into Linkin Park my first year of college. that was right when Hybrid Theory was coming out and "One Step Closer" was on the radio all the time. i caught more and more flak for liking them as they got more and more popular, but i don't care. their songs are catchy, they have great beats, and back in 2000 they didn't sound like anything else that was on the radio. maybe it's the sulking emo kid in me...but my favourite song of theirs has always been "Numb." it's a little less peppy than most of their stuff, but it's a great song all the same:
Orgy
Orgy was the first rock band i ever liked who features techno beats prominently. i'm not sure if their music actually falls under the outer fringes of nü metal or not, but between the time they got popular [1998], their close ties with Korn [they were on Elementree Records, Korn's imprint], and the music styles they fuse...i include them here. they had a little more techno-goth and a lot less grunge than most bands in the category, but they definitely smoothed the path to the radio airwaves for clearly nü metal bands like Linkin Park. this is my favourite Orgy song, "Dizzy"--the last song on their album Candyass, and one i recently mentioned in 74 Minutes or Less:
Staind
okay, so their later music consists of attempts to reproduce the success of "It's Been Awhile." they morphed from the realm of nü metal to the realm of...well, almost adult alternative. that doesn't make Tormented, Dysfunction, or about half of Break the Cycle any less awesome. back then the songs were raw, and Aaron Lewis had the sexiest, breathiest heavy rock voice i knew. this was the song that got me hooked on them: "Just Go."
finally, four more bands who have done something compelling with the genre have been recent subjects of posts on this blog: 3rd Strike, Lifer, Flaw, and Videodrone.
so, the next time you hear some music snob dismiss nü metal offhand, take him to task for it. for every Limp Bizkit, Crazy Town, or Hed(PE) who makes your ears bleed, there is a Finger Eleven, Drowning Pool, or Videodrone to bring the rock.
***
1 if the only songs of theirs you've heard are "One Thing" or anything on Them Vs. You Vs. Me, you're going to be wondering what i'm talking about when i say there's a funk influence. that stuff is dross. i'm as bitter about Them Vs. You Vs. Me as i am about Underneath by The Verve Pipe. the whole rant is too long for a footnote, though; don't be surprised to see a full entry about it at some point.
people deride the music that falls under that umbrella as boring. meaningless. repetitive. dull. sure enough, there is a lot of subpar music that qualifies as nü metal. most people view Korn and Limp Bizkit as the standard bearers of the genre. Korn isn't my favourite band in the world. i always found them to be extremely boring, and many of their songs sounded the same. "Freak on a Leash" was a good tune, though...it was an apt anthem for a misunderstood teen, and i was a sixteen-year-old high school loner when the song came out. furthermore, they were one of the first bands to hit the mainstream with a detuned amalgam of rock, metal, rap, and funk. they weren't the best of the bunch, but i respect their role in beginning to clear out a place in the music scene for the genre...and even though they were usually boring, they never made me want to weep for humanity.
[as for Limp Bizkit...well, there's really no defense for Limp Bizkit. they were one of the worst bands of the nineties, if not the very worst. that's one point, probably the only point, on which the nü metal haters and i see eye to eye. their music sounds like party pop-rap with guitars.]
the term nü metal is a fairly vague one, to be sure...it started as almost a synonym for rap-rock, and then started to refer to bands who were in that same grey space between grunge and metal, but didn't necessarily have as many rap influences. by the early aughts, very few popular nü metal bands [save Linkin Park...] had or retained much rap styling at all. the term is less than specific...but none but the broadest terms for music have very fuzzy great areas, and i'm going to stick with the nomenclature because its spectrum is familiar to anyone who knows a bit about nineties music.
anyway...there was a lot of schlock promulgated under the umbrella of nü metal, and people bring that up to disparage every band with that handful of influences. but, the fact remains that there's a lot of schlock under any given musical label. just like wheat and chaff coexist under any musical label, there is good nü metal and bad nü metal. from here on out, we focus on the good; there are a lot of gems that people roll their eyes and dismiss because it happens to be nü metal. there are a lot of songs in that style that honestly portray emotion, that have compelling melodies, and prove that the flak that people give the genre as a whole is very often unwarranted.
Disturbed
their first album was full of rap influences which have faded away as time has gone by. although their first album, Down With The Sickness, remains their best to date, they still put out solid music and they're one of the few late nineties or very early aughts bands who remains recognizable, about as good as they were. my favourite song of theirs is "Remember"--it sets the mood of being fixated on something that happened in the past, and the melody haunts.
Drowning Pool
Drowning Pool is not the same band they were back in the early oughts. Dave Williams, their lead singer, died in the summer of 2002...that's the only time i've ever cried when a famous person has died. the new singer isn't nearly as good. his voice went from screaming to growling to singing so seamlessly, and Sinner rocked from start to finish. i'm sure you all know "Bodies" already...this is the video for "Tear Away," which is a little more like the rest of Sinner and a better song to boot.
Finger Eleven
Finger Eleven is one of my two favourite bands [the other being Cold]. even in their earliest music they never had much of a rap influence, but the grunge, metal, and funk influences pervade their music.1 [in fact, before they were Finger Eleven, they called themselves the Rainbow Butt Monkeys, and were more of a funk band than a rock band.] their first three albums were fantastic...really, the only dud on any of them was "One Thing." everything else, fast or slow, was good, solid rock--like this, their song "Quicksand" from their first album.
Linkin Park
i got into Linkin Park my first year of college. that was right when Hybrid Theory was coming out and "One Step Closer" was on the radio all the time. i caught more and more flak for liking them as they got more and more popular, but i don't care. their songs are catchy, they have great beats, and back in 2000 they didn't sound like anything else that was on the radio. maybe it's the sulking emo kid in me...but my favourite song of theirs has always been "Numb." it's a little less peppy than most of their stuff, but it's a great song all the same:
Orgy
Orgy was the first rock band i ever liked who features techno beats prominently. i'm not sure if their music actually falls under the outer fringes of nü metal or not, but between the time they got popular [1998], their close ties with Korn [they were on Elementree Records, Korn's imprint], and the music styles they fuse...i include them here. they had a little more techno-goth and a lot less grunge than most bands in the category, but they definitely smoothed the path to the radio airwaves for clearly nü metal bands like Linkin Park. this is my favourite Orgy song, "Dizzy"--the last song on their album Candyass, and one i recently mentioned in 74 Minutes or Less:
Staind
okay, so their later music consists of attempts to reproduce the success of "It's Been Awhile." they morphed from the realm of nü metal to the realm of...well, almost adult alternative. that doesn't make Tormented, Dysfunction, or about half of Break the Cycle any less awesome. back then the songs were raw, and Aaron Lewis had the sexiest, breathiest heavy rock voice i knew. this was the song that got me hooked on them: "Just Go."
finally, four more bands who have done something compelling with the genre have been recent subjects of posts on this blog: 3rd Strike, Lifer, Flaw, and Videodrone.
so, the next time you hear some music snob dismiss nü metal offhand, take him to task for it. for every Limp Bizkit, Crazy Town, or Hed(PE) who makes your ears bleed, there is a Finger Eleven, Drowning Pool, or Videodrone to bring the rock.
***
1 if the only songs of theirs you've heard are "One Thing" or anything on Them Vs. You Vs. Me, you're going to be wondering what i'm talking about when i say there's a funk influence. that stuff is dross. i'm as bitter about Them Vs. You Vs. Me as i am about Underneath by The Verve Pipe. the whole rant is too long for a footnote, though; don't be surprised to see a full entry about it at some point.
1.22.2008
we connect like puzzle pieces. look into my eyes, no words are needed. where have you been all my life?
few people ever gave Videodrone enough respect in the 1990s. they were signed to Elementree Records and lumped into the same corner of the music world as Limp Bizkit, Staind, Orgy...specifically Korn and the bands that they [or their progeny] popularized. Videodrone always seemed to get swept under the rug. they didn't fit in...they were still just a little too rough-edged to gain much mainstream appeal, and their music wasn't easily adaptable for such tastes.
i first heard them in the summer of 1999, when they opened for Orgy. even though Orgy had the more memorable stage presence, Videodrone had the better music. i bought the album soon after the concert, and eight and a half years later it still remains in regular rotation. i always thought it was a shame that the self-titled album was the only one they released, because it was so good.
the group did release a few other recordings under the name Cradle of Thorns, but the music under that name was so different from the music that Videodrone put out that they can hardly be considered the same band. i didn't find the old Cradle of Thorns music very interesting. it had a lot of anger and a lot of edge, and featured Ty Elam's strong voice, but the band had not yet learned how to put together a compelling melody.
that all changed with Videodrone. one member of the band left so the band renamed itself...and exhibited a previously unreached level of songwriting prowess. the only song that reminded me much of Cradle of Thorns was "L.S.D. (Lucifer's Stained Dress)." to this day, that's the one track that i still skip over. i listen to everything else. it's just as angry as the Cradle of Thorns stuff, and just as emotional...but it expresses the emotions more melodically than the older songs.
this is the only song for which they ever made a video: "Ty Jonathan Down."
that's one of my favourite tracks on the album...but to hit the highest points, you need to listen to two other songs: "Faceplant" and "Alone With 20 Bucks". "Faceplant" is a song about cheating, but from the cheater's point of view. the speaker is an asshole, a commitment-phobe...but there's enough there in the song that is so human that even someone who is not slimy can relate to the fears expressed. "Alone With 20 Bucks" is most likely about someone who is out looking for a prostitute...but focuses less on the act and more on how artificial and detached it can feel to have grown up in modern society.
that's the beauty of Videodrone, and another thing that sets it apart from Cradle of Thorns: even though the topics of the songs range from horrible to just sleazy, they portray the topics in a way that any person who isn't hiding behind rose-coloured glasses can relate to. even though the album came out near the end of the decade, their self-titled album is easily one of my top records of the nineties.
Videodrone has been dead and gone since 2000, but technically Cradle of Thorns has been revived. i say technically because it lacks any original members other than Ty Elam. musically, it lies somewhere in between the old Cradle of Thorns and Videodrone. it's a little more melodic than the old stuff, and features fewer attempts to be scary for the sake of being scary.
however, the music isn't quite as interesting. they've got four songs posted on their myspace to listen to: two songs from 1990, and two songs from the new incarnation of Cradle of Thorns. as for the new songs, i'm disappointed. both of the new ones have a melodic idea that feels like it's building somewhere, but never seems to get there.
the melody in "All Over Again" is especially engaging at first listen. after about a minute and a half it gets disappointingly repetitive. the verses are so promising; the melody tantalizingly builds, and feels like it's going somewhere interesting. however, the chorus and the bridge do not feel like the places where the song is supposed to go...on the contrary, they lack the energy of the verses, and hinder the progress of the song.
in other words...Ty has a gorgeous voice, but was obviously not the only force behind Videodrone's music. it doesn't matter if it's new Cradle of Thorns or old Cradle of Thorns...i'd rather have Videodrone any day.
i first heard them in the summer of 1999, when they opened for Orgy. even though Orgy had the more memorable stage presence, Videodrone had the better music. i bought the album soon after the concert, and eight and a half years later it still remains in regular rotation. i always thought it was a shame that the self-titled album was the only one they released, because it was so good.
the group did release a few other recordings under the name Cradle of Thorns, but the music under that name was so different from the music that Videodrone put out that they can hardly be considered the same band. i didn't find the old Cradle of Thorns music very interesting. it had a lot of anger and a lot of edge, and featured Ty Elam's strong voice, but the band had not yet learned how to put together a compelling melody.
that all changed with Videodrone. one member of the band left so the band renamed itself...and exhibited a previously unreached level of songwriting prowess. the only song that reminded me much of Cradle of Thorns was "L.S.D. (Lucifer's Stained Dress)." to this day, that's the one track that i still skip over. i listen to everything else. it's just as angry as the Cradle of Thorns stuff, and just as emotional...but it expresses the emotions more melodically than the older songs.
this is the only song for which they ever made a video: "Ty Jonathan Down."
that's one of my favourite tracks on the album...but to hit the highest points, you need to listen to two other songs: "Faceplant" and "Alone With 20 Bucks". "Faceplant" is a song about cheating, but from the cheater's point of view. the speaker is an asshole, a commitment-phobe...but there's enough there in the song that is so human that even someone who is not slimy can relate to the fears expressed. "Alone With 20 Bucks" is most likely about someone who is out looking for a prostitute...but focuses less on the act and more on how artificial and detached it can feel to have grown up in modern society.
that's the beauty of Videodrone, and another thing that sets it apart from Cradle of Thorns: even though the topics of the songs range from horrible to just sleazy, they portray the topics in a way that any person who isn't hiding behind rose-coloured glasses can relate to. even though the album came out near the end of the decade, their self-titled album is easily one of my top records of the nineties.
Videodrone has been dead and gone since 2000, but technically Cradle of Thorns has been revived. i say technically because it lacks any original members other than Ty Elam. musically, it lies somewhere in between the old Cradle of Thorns and Videodrone. it's a little more melodic than the old stuff, and features fewer attempts to be scary for the sake of being scary.
however, the music isn't quite as interesting. they've got four songs posted on their myspace to listen to: two songs from 1990, and two songs from the new incarnation of Cradle of Thorns. as for the new songs, i'm disappointed. both of the new ones have a melodic idea that feels like it's building somewhere, but never seems to get there.
the melody in "All Over Again" is especially engaging at first listen. after about a minute and a half it gets disappointingly repetitive. the verses are so promising; the melody tantalizingly builds, and feels like it's going somewhere interesting. however, the chorus and the bridge do not feel like the places where the song is supposed to go...on the contrary, they lack the energy of the verses, and hinder the progress of the song.
in other words...Ty has a gorgeous voice, but was obviously not the only force behind Videodrone's music. it doesn't matter if it's new Cradle of Thorns or old Cradle of Thorns...i'd rather have Videodrone any day.
1.17.2008
74 Minutes or Less #3: 1998
welcome to the third installment of 74 Minutes or Less.
74 Minutes or Less is the weekly supergig playlist. the concept is simple: i pick a theme, i choose at most 74 minutes of music that fits the theme, and i discuss it here. if you, or i, or anyone else thinks the playlist is so awesome that it deserves to be compiled and burned to CD for posterity, it won't be a problem--because it's no longer than 74 minutes.
this week's theme is 1998. 1998 was the first year during which i was a music fan from beginning to end. i had my awakening in the middle of 1997...but by the time 1998 rolled around, i had a decent idea of the lay of the musical land, i had a handful of bands i liked, and was building on that through such groundbreaking sources as the internet and MTV's 120 Minutes.
[of course i mean "groundbreaking" sarcastically. i was fifteen, sixteen years old. what do you expect?]
i determined what music was from 1998 by album release date. it's the fairest way to do it...my memory is a little fuzzy about what songs are from specific years. some 1996 or 1997 songs i did not hear until that year, and some 1999 or 2000 songs i sometimes think are from 1998, because everything just lumps together in my brain as "songs that i really, really liked in high school." furthermore, even though i discovered some of these songs significantly later than 1998, it's still a testament to the wonderful state of music that year, and it was my folly that i didn't hear the song until later.
i decided to go by first album release date and not by single release date or album reprint release date. this may mean i miss out on some great songs that hit the height of their popularity in 1998, but if i do lists for other years, they have a fair shake of getting on the list for the year the album first came out. i had to draw the line somewhere, so there's the line. it's a little heartbreaking, because i have to exclude "Flagpole Sitta" by Harvey Danger. that song defined the summer of 1998 for me, but Where Have All The Merrymakers Gone? was originally released in 1997. it was re-released by a major label in 1998, but since the album in its entirety was released by Arena Rock (an independent label) in 1997, it is a 1997 song by the rules i laid down for this project.
i also don't include songs from greatest hits albums, also to avoid double-counting. seriously, though? that's just cheating. a song compiled on a Greatest Hits album in 1998 is not a part of the musical landscape of 1998 by virtue of that coincidence. it still belongs to the year during which it was first released.
with those ground rules, i present: 74 minutes or less of the best music from 1998, in order by album release date.
that was 74 Minutes or Less #3: 1998. if you've got a thematic idea for a future playlist, comment or email me at superherogirl@gmail.com.
74 Minutes or Less is the weekly supergig playlist. the concept is simple: i pick a theme, i choose at most 74 minutes of music that fits the theme, and i discuss it here. if you, or i, or anyone else thinks the playlist is so awesome that it deserves to be compiled and burned to CD for posterity, it won't be a problem--because it's no longer than 74 minutes.
this week's theme is 1998. 1998 was the first year during which i was a music fan from beginning to end. i had my awakening in the middle of 1997...but by the time 1998 rolled around, i had a decent idea of the lay of the musical land, i had a handful of bands i liked, and was building on that through such groundbreaking sources as the internet and MTV's 120 Minutes.
[of course i mean "groundbreaking" sarcastically. i was fifteen, sixteen years old. what do you expect?]
i determined what music was from 1998 by album release date. it's the fairest way to do it...my memory is a little fuzzy about what songs are from specific years. some 1996 or 1997 songs i did not hear until that year, and some 1999 or 2000 songs i sometimes think are from 1998, because everything just lumps together in my brain as "songs that i really, really liked in high school." furthermore, even though i discovered some of these songs significantly later than 1998, it's still a testament to the wonderful state of music that year, and it was my folly that i didn't hear the song until later.
i decided to go by first album release date and not by single release date or album reprint release date. this may mean i miss out on some great songs that hit the height of their popularity in 1998, but if i do lists for other years, they have a fair shake of getting on the list for the year the album first came out. i had to draw the line somewhere, so there's the line. it's a little heartbreaking, because i have to exclude "Flagpole Sitta" by Harvey Danger. that song defined the summer of 1998 for me, but Where Have All The Merrymakers Gone? was originally released in 1997. it was re-released by a major label in 1998, but since the album in its entirety was released by Arena Rock (an independent label) in 1997, it is a 1997 song by the rules i laid down for this project.
i also don't include songs from greatest hits albums, also to avoid double-counting. seriously, though? that's just cheating. a song compiled on a Greatest Hits album in 1998 is not a part of the musical landscape of 1998 by virtue of that coincidence. it still belongs to the year during which it was first released.
with those ground rules, i present: 74 minutes or less of the best music from 1998, in order by album release date.
- "Meet Virginia" by Train (Train, released February 24, 1998) (4:00)
- ten years ago, this was an anthem of my teenage frustration. i scared one of my classmates with a quote from this song that was written on my backpack: "well she wants to live her life/then she thinks about her life/throws her hair back as she screams/i don't really want to live this life." he thought i was suicidal. it wasn't that...i was just frustrated, as any high school loner was. and, the plaintive screaming, almost crying, in this song was anthemic. i'm only sometimes so disillusioned anymore, and find it easier to see Virginia's beautiful side. it's not the defining song it was in high school, but i still really like listening to it.
- "Airport Song" by Guster (Goldfly, released March 4, 1998) (3:13)
- there's no deep meaning behind why this song is on here. the bongo drums have a good beat, the harmonies are tight, and it's catchy enough to pop into my head at the weirdest of times. it's just a fun song. they played it quite a bit on the radio over that summer when i was at nerd camp...and then i didn't hear it again for a few years afterward because they never played it at home. i missed it.
- "Untitled" by Fuel (Sunburn, released March 31, 1998) (3:58)
- forget the singles; this song is Fuel at its best. it's so simple: the song has very few lyrics, but they all go to the heart of being stuck in a rut and feeling frustrated. the music fits the mood perfectly...it's a simple, repetitive guitar motif that just feels like banging on that wall that you're trapped behind.
- "I Got The Hook-Up" by Master P (I Got The Hook-Up (original motion picture soundtrack), released April 7, 1998) (4:14)
- some songs are so hilariously awful that they stick with you. this is one of them. sure, it's one more piece of that ubiquitous pabulum that Master P's No Limit Records put out during the late nineties. but, this song made me laugh then, and it still makes me laugh ten years later. it's repetitive, it's ridiculous, and that's all part of its charm. it's the title theme to Master P's movie about a skeezy stolen cell phone schemer...and if that subject matter can't underlie a song so bad it's good, i don't know what can.
- "Waking Up Beside You" by Stabbing Westward (Darkest Days, released April 7, 1998) (6:34)
- i'm not prone to the emotion conveyed in this song: this song is about profoundly missing an ex, whereas my general practice is to cut an ex loose and never look back. still, this song is gorgeous...and a perfect ending to Darkest Days: a concept album about the psychological process of getting through a breakup. in this song...the speaker is done being shocked, he's done with his unrealistic expectations of moving on too soon, he's done being mad...and he is just sad now that he is finally coming to terms with the fact that it's over. it took sixteen songs to get here, and it's a worthy ending to a powerful cycle of songs.
- "Open Road Song" by Eve 6 (Eve 6, released April 28, 1998) (3:17)
- i hate driving, but i love driving songs. i love the feeling of being in transit...being neither here nor there. it feels like i'm progressing and improving, but since i'm moving i really don't have to do anything about my cares until i get to a destination. most driving songs just make me feel happy and carefree. this song is sort the meta-driving song: it's a great driving song about driving with a great driving song on the radio.
- "Give" by Cold (Cold, released June 2, 1998) (3:50)
- i didn't get into Cold until 2000 or 2001, but i remember reading a review of this album in a guitar magazine when it came out. i ignored it, but realised later that i was an idiot for ignoring it. i had cheated myself out of two years of quality time with this album. this song is the best of it: the guitars drive forcefully and the lyrics convey honest, unbridled anger. it's a perfect anthem for those bad days when you don't want to throw a pity party, but just want to slap people or break things.
- "Stay Awake" by Dishwalla (And You Think You Know What Life's About, released August 11, 1998) (4:15)
- everyone knows Dishwalla for "Counting Blue Cars"...a song i think is a rather boring example of nineties pop-rock. i never much liked it. that's why this song took me by surprise. it has a little bit darker feeling to it, and an almost techno-sounding use of guitar feedback.
- "Dizzy" by Orgy (Candyass, released August 18, 1998) (3:21)
- i always feel so bad for liking this song. the lyrics verge on the misogynistic ("you're just another pretty face in a roomful of whores/no, you don't mean much"). but, i always end up ignoring it because the song sounds so cool. Jay Gordon's voice sounds like a robot in the beginning, and as he repeats the same lyrics over and over again, he sounds more and more like a person...it's as if he realises what's going on and moves from robotic detachment to human indignation. the effect of the transition is interesting, and stays just as fascinating after many listens to the song.
- "At The Stars" by Better Than Ezra (How Does Your Garden Grow?, released August 25, 1998) (3:43)
- Better Than Ezra's greatest songs are all their melodramatic ballads. "Desperately Wanting" is probably their best one, but this one is not far behind. it holds it own. it's the second of three driving songs...although, unlike the other two, it doesn't have the vibe of driving to take advantage of freedom. it's a very atypical driving song. instead, this one encompasses the opposite feeling: driving because things where you should be are so bad that the road is the only place to disappear. it brings a feeling of freedom...but freedom through avoidance, and not because you're actually carefree.
- "Keep Away" by Godsmack (Godsmack, released August 25, 1998) (4:50)
- this song stands the test of time far worse than anything else on here. it's a bit boring, and extremely trite--a teen angst anthem that only a teenager could appreciate. but, i loved this song so much in high school that i had to put it on here. i have such a soft spot for it because i went to such great lengths to hear it. it came on a radio station that only came on in the car, not in the house. so, if my parents ever needed an errand run around 9pm when the countdown on this station was on, i would beg them to let me drive, because it was the only way i would ever be able to hear this song.
- "Coma White" by Marilyn Manson (Mechanical Animals, released September 15, 1998) (5:38)
- most songs by Marilyn Manson are spooky in an overdone way...they try to be scary and shocking. that's why i don't care for a lot of their music. it sounds forced. however, this one is genuinely spooky. they didn't try to tell a story about death and destruction and apocalypse...instead, they painted an honest picture of a drug addict falling further and further away from reality and human connection. no one was preaching anything. no one was glorifying anything. the song is very well-done: it taps into a real human fear of disconnection with other people. for that, it's spooky.
- "Black Balloon" by Goo Goo Dolls (Dizzy Up The Girl, released September 22, 1998) (4:09)
- this song is just pretty. there's very little else to say about it...the song itself is very simple, although every time i think of harmonies that could be added to it and start trying to sing them. they're nice enough and they make harmonic sense...but they don't ever work as well as the original. the sparse arrangement works; this song doesn't need glitter or flair.
- "My Favourite Game" by The Cardigans (Gran Turismo, released October 1, 1998) (3:36)
- this is the last of the driving songs on here; 1998 was a great year for driving songs. everyone associates The Cardigans with that awfully annoying "Lovefool" song. i couldn't stand that song; it was far too cutesie for my tastes. this song is a far better use of Nina Persson's voice. instead of sounding simpering, she sounds sultry. unlike the other driving songs on this list, the subject matter has nothing to do with driving a car...but the song is so perfectly suited for flying down the road that i can think of nothing else when i listen to it.
- "Every Monday" by The Marvelous 3 (Hey Album!, released October 27, 1998) (3:23)
- i had heard "Freak of the Week" back in 1998, but i didn't hear this song until several years later. i love the part in the first verse where the speaker "talked to the city that knows me by name/and all the bad things that i do." most of the song is just a really catchy breakup song...but that line does such a good job of portraying how a place can feel like home. a home city really is like a good friend...you can do all kinds of awful things there, and still feel close to it. that's how i feel whenever i'm in Chicago...i've been at my best there, i've been at my worst there, and i feel a personal connection to the place no matter what.
- "The Kids Aren't Alright" by The Offspring (Americana, released November 17, 1998) (3:00)
- the lyrics are a pointed description of failed teenage lives, but that's not why it's one of the best songs of 1998. the guitar riff at the beginning of the song is. it smoothly braids together the elements of the song in one interesting soundscape before the verses unpack it. many introductions try to do this, but few succeed nearly as well as this one.
- "Turn the Page" by Metallica (Garage, Inc., released November 24, 1998) (6:06)
- Bob Seger originally did this, but Metallica found a good thing and improved on it. i was never a fan of Bob Seger's version; i always found it to be far too languid for my tastes. Metallica put some much-needed energy into the song. the basic melody is the same as the original, but what they did with it was far more interesting. they did exactly what you need to do when making a cover: they put their own take on it. it wasn't Metallica trying to copy Bob Seger. it was Metallica taking Bob Seger's melodic idea and turning it into one of the best Metallica songs ever.
that was 74 Minutes or Less #3: 1998. if you've got a thematic idea for a future playlist, comment or email me at superherogirl@gmail.com.
12.31.2007
there's nowhere to go after the show...but that's alright.
this past thursday night, i had the chance to do something i had never done before: see The Verve Pipe in concert. they were my favourite band through high school, and they were the band who got me into music back in the summer of 1997. i still listen to them a lot, and count two of their albums [The Verve Pipe and Pop Smear] among my all-time favourites. but, even though i've been a fan of the band for over a decade, i had never been able to see them live.
i finally saw them, and it got my mind racing.
the scene
usually "bar with a stage" is my way of describing the best concert venues ever: the most intimate places. a "bar with a stage" is a cramped little bar with a tiny stage in the corner around which the band's faithful must crowd. everyone is close together, and everyone feeds off of the energy of everyone else.
the Voodoo Lounge in Maryland Heights is a bar with a stage, alright. but the Voodoo Lounge is not a concert venue. instead, it takes the concept to its opposite, most impersonal extreme. it's a bar with a stage situated about twelve feet in the air: over the bar and up a wall.
the seating area is expansive. most of the people are sitting at tables; the place is more often used as a restaurant than as a concert venue. what would be the standing area, the floor between the bar and the booths, was full of chairs, the same kinds of chairs a convention centre drags out to seat large crowds at faceless business conferences.
the place was empty. as the concert started very few of the pit seats were taken, and less than half of the tables were occupied. the room abounded with a feeling emptiness: most of the space that could hold people was empty, and even if the crowd area were full there would have been all that empty open air overhead, between the fans and the band.
at least the Voodoo Lounge had the pre-show music down pat. the pre-show music over the PA system was mostly 1990s music: Stone Temple Pilots, mid-career 311, old Audioslave.
the band
The Verve Pipe is a quintessentially 1990s band. to me, they represent the decade. their song "The Freshmen" was my gateway into nineties rock, their rove of little-known music is the kaleidoscope of what great and diverse rock music was made to be, and the too-brief trajectory of their fame is a testament to the narrow scope and the attention deficit disorder of nineties radio, music television, and tastemakers.
i have never shaken the feeling that if people gave the songs that didn't sound like "the freshmen" a chance that The Verve Pipe could have been one of the best-loved band in america. they went in many musical directions on their first four albums [especially on their second and fourth], and did it all well. from fast and bitter ["Bullies on Vacation," "Television," "I've Suffered a Head Injury"] to deep and introspective ["She Has Faces," "The River," "Acting as Your Slave"] to downright youthful ["Generations," "Real," "Even the Score"]--the band never got hopelessly tied to any mood or style, and could do all of them well. the lyrics, as well, were masterful: they were intelligent, and they painted honest emotional pictures.
a lingering disappointment
i'm still very bitter about their fifth album, Underneath, and have been since it came out in 2001. that was the last real studio album the band put out--and it was terrible. it symbolized capitulation. it was pop of the worst kind. instead of testing the stylistic and emotional expanses of the form as the band did in Pop Smear and The Verve Pipe, it contained an attempt to release an album full of radio-friendly "adult alternative" hits. just as any attempt to crank out an album full of palatable music fails...this album failed. sure, the band chanced upon a huge adult radio hit with "The Freshmen," but it was just that: chance. the song was a heart-wrenching portrait of something very painful. it had genuine emotion. it wasn't written way back in 1992 to please millions of listeners: it was the product of some inspiration. it just happened to strike a chord with a lot of people a few years later.
Underneath abandoned the interest, the excitement, and the sense of genre-busting adventure that made the self-titled album so brilliant. on the other hand, it also failed to produce the radio hit that the entire album was so clearly a plea for. "Never Let You Down" got a few spins and "Colorful" was in the movie Rock Star, but nothing ever even skirted the commercial success of "The Freshmen." the songs didn't contain the emotional power of the band's previous work. many of the songs dripped with sap. they felt like love songs for the sake of love songs, as opposed to love songs because the person who wrote it was really that moved by love. and...the album disappeared. as dumb as a lot of the music-consuming public may be, people instinctively know the difference between a truly sentimental song and a song that is sappy only because someone behind it thought it would play well in the top 40.
maybe that album just took me by surprise. i thought that if they were ever going to release That Pandering Album, it would come out right after Villains. it didn't. after Villains came The Verve Pipe--an album just as varied, edgy, and devil-may-care as Pop Smear, the genre-spanning indie release from 1993. the self-titled album was a masterpiece, a collection that, if i didn't know better, i could have sworn had been made by several bands that specified in several kinds of music. i thought the band didn't care about convention. i thought they'd keep ignoring the whims of the music brass and keep making the diverse music they had been making for nigh on ten years by then.
i don't know what happened, or why. maybe i neglected to take into account the feelings of immortality that fame brings and the feelings of desperation that can set in as fame fades. The Verve Pipe didn't produce any real radio hits. "Hero" got played a few times because it was the first single, but it never really caught on. the album wasn't very accessible to radio. maybe someone thought that they needed to recapture that radio success, and do everything that was within their power to try. i don't know...this is all conjecture from a fan who holds the bands she loves to a far higher standard than the bands she does not love, because she knows what they can do.
that's enough about that album: in short, Underneath disappointed me, and i am still bitter. i'd be less bitter if they had just charged on and continued to make studio albums after Underneath. it would have softened the sting, or made me forget it altogether, if they had released another rich, interesting studio album at some point between 2001 and now. but, they haven't. they haven't released any true new album since then.
the show
i finally have something to salve my frustrations of the last six years. The Verve Pipe is mostly broken up: they get together every december and play some shows around the midwest, and that's it. this year i finally managed to make a show on that tour: my first Verve Pipe concert ever. and...it was wonderful. the band sounded great, at least as good as on any studio track they ever put out. the songs had more than enough energy to reach from their unfortunate perch above the bar all the way out to every member of the crowd. Brian Vander Ark's voice had not aged a bit. Doug Corella, the keyboard player, had a rig perfectly suited to the brilliant jack-of-all-trades that he is: a keyboard, a large cymbal on each side of the keyboard, and a drumset off to the side of the keyboard.
they played these songs:
the show did teach me a valuable lesson: not every song from Underneath was a clunker. two of the songs on there can, at least live, hold their own with anything else The Verve Pipe has ever performed. "Gotta Move On" was haunting; the lead guitar alone was enough to rip my heart right out of my chest. i could just feel the heartbreak, and there was nothing boring or merely palatable about that song. it was real. the encore, "Local Boys," just rocked. it had a great beat and energy to it...and the lyrics made the song feel like a less-jaded, more mature sequel to "Supergig" from the self-titled album. i'm still no fan of Underneath, but the concert did make me appreciate those two songs a lot.
i got some pictures of the set...although most of them are not very good. the stage lighting was terrible for anyone who wanted to get pictures of anyone who wasn't right up front, since there was almost no light anywhere else. i couldn't get near enough to the stage for the flash to make much of a difference, since the stage was twelve feet in the air. so, i got some almost-clear pictures of Brian and of Griff the Harmonica Solo Guy, but no one else came out very clear in any of them. this made me sad: i wanted good stage pictures of Brian Vander Ark, Donny Brown, and Doug Corella, the three band members remaining from when i was in high school. Brian was right up front, but Donny was back on drums and Doug was back on percussion. they never looked like anything but shadows in any of my shots.
the people
the band was mostly, although not completely, intact from the old days. as i said, three members remained from the early nineties: Brian, Donny, and Doug. Brian and Donny have been in the band since its inception in 1992 and have co-written and played songs on every album. they have been the driving creative forces behind the band, and it would just not be The Verve Pipe anymore if either of them left the band. Doug was not in the band for I've Suffered a Head Injury, but joined for Pop Smear in 1993 and has been in the band ever since. he has played keyboard, percussion, drums...he's the bands brilliant multi-instrumentalist jack of all trades.
the rest of the band is new. it was very weird seeing someone other than Brad Vander Ark playing bass and someone other than A.J. Dunning playing lead guitar. they were played instead by two guys i did not recognize. i didn't know their names. they were never introduced during the show, and i can't even seem to find them on the band's website or in the message boards. i couldn't complain at all about their instrumental proficiency--the songs sounded just like the songs i knew and loved. i was just a little unsettled by not recognizing all of the faces on stage, the same way i always am when a band i have loved for a very long time has a personnel change.
and then, there was Griff, the harmonica guy. that was weird. i was a little confused seeing a harmonica player up there because The Verve Pipe never had harmonicas in any of their songs on the studio albums. even though some of the solos dragged on far longer than they needed to, they were well-done...there were harmonica parts in four or five of the songs, and each worked nicely with the original idea of the song and what the rest of the band was playing.
concert as context for self-overanalysis
the harmonica player brought me my first realisation of the stark difference between my outlook in seeing The Verve Pipe at age twenty-five compared to what it would have been when i was in high school. during one of the songs about midway through the show, i got up for a drink. i picked it up from the bar, turned back toward my seat, and then saw him near the door talking to someone. i strolled over there and told him he did a good job with the "Spoonful of Sugar" solo.
he cut me off as i was finishing, and asked me what my shirt said. i told him--i was wearing my "feelings are boring. kissing is awesome." shirt. he then leaned in to give me a kiss. i guess i was asking for it by wearing that shirt, so i let him give me a chaste peck, and then i quickly shuffled back to my table to take in the rest of the concert in peace.
i then got to thinking: in itself, the event was totally forgettable. i wore a snarky shirt, someone reacted to it in the expected way, and then i went along with my life. but, my high school self would not have reacted that way. if some guy who had been on stage with the verve pipe had tried to kiss me when i was in high school, even if he had not been a full-fledged or original band member, i would have been over the moon. it would have been a defining moment for me. i would have written endlessly about it in my notebooks. there would have been copious amounts of bad teenage poetry about the event. i would have written excitedly about the event to my pen pal and to all the TVP-loving teenagers i talked to online every night. everyone i knew would have been very sick of my ranting and raving.
but, it happened at age twenty-five and not age fourteen or sixteen. it was only remarkable for pointing out how i have changed over the last ten years. i've become far more jaded and realistic about certain events. if there is no real meaning behind them, i am willing to admit that...whereas, when i was fourteen, the slightest eye contact, hug, or anything else from a person in a band was enough to make me read everything into it.
the aftermath
after the concert came one of the most surreal moments of my entire life. most of the band went over by the merch booth to meet fans and sign autographs. even when i was a teenager, i was never prone to being starstruck in front of rockers. there's a difference between being starstruck and the actual problem of blowing incidents out of proportion that i had when i was a teenager. when i was at the concert venue, i was fine: i could meet musicians i loved, carry on intelligent conversations with them, and only later become too giddy about the event to function. i would later run the encounter through my head so many times that it became an almost fictionalized paragon of the actual event--but during the encounter, i was level-headed. i wasn't a gibbering idiot.
thursday night after the concert, i finally fell victim to being starstruck. i met both Brian and Donny after the show, and all i could think of to say was that i had been a fan for over ten years, that it was my first show, and that their music got me through so much in high school. i was nervous, i was shaking, and i kept repeating myself. i did have the presence of mind to ask if they'd be in pictures with me...but, as you can see from the ear-to-ear grin on my face, i was completely overwhelmed with glee from finally meeting members of The Verve Pipe:
me and Brian:
Brian, me, and Donny:
Brian and Donny were nice...i just wish i could have thought of something intelligent to say to them after the show.
the end
so, i have spent most of this time dwelling upon the negative, the absurd, and my bizarre reactions to finally seeing my favourite band from my teenage years many years later. i didn't mean to do that, because it downplays the overwhelming feeling i had when i left the Voodoo Lounge on thursday night: that the concert was amazing, and something about my life finally felt complete once i got to see them. it made me proud all over again to be a fan of The Verve Pipe. i just don't think i had ever completely hashed out my feelings about them since i left high school, so my last seven years of intermittently thinking about the band never really congealed or came flowing out in any coherent manner until now.
i finally saw them, and it got my mind racing.
the scene
usually "bar with a stage" is my way of describing the best concert venues ever: the most intimate places. a "bar with a stage" is a cramped little bar with a tiny stage in the corner around which the band's faithful must crowd. everyone is close together, and everyone feeds off of the energy of everyone else.
the Voodoo Lounge in Maryland Heights is a bar with a stage, alright. but the Voodoo Lounge is not a concert venue. instead, it takes the concept to its opposite, most impersonal extreme. it's a bar with a stage situated about twelve feet in the air: over the bar and up a wall.
the seating area is expansive. most of the people are sitting at tables; the place is more often used as a restaurant than as a concert venue. what would be the standing area, the floor between the bar and the booths, was full of chairs, the same kinds of chairs a convention centre drags out to seat large crowds at faceless business conferences.
the place was empty. as the concert started very few of the pit seats were taken, and less than half of the tables were occupied. the room abounded with a feeling emptiness: most of the space that could hold people was empty, and even if the crowd area were full there would have been all that empty open air overhead, between the fans and the band.
at least the Voodoo Lounge had the pre-show music down pat. the pre-show music over the PA system was mostly 1990s music: Stone Temple Pilots, mid-career 311, old Audioslave.
the band
The Verve Pipe is a quintessentially 1990s band. to me, they represent the decade. their song "The Freshmen" was my gateway into nineties rock, their rove of little-known music is the kaleidoscope of what great and diverse rock music was made to be, and the too-brief trajectory of their fame is a testament to the narrow scope and the attention deficit disorder of nineties radio, music television, and tastemakers.
i have never shaken the feeling that if people gave the songs that didn't sound like "the freshmen" a chance that The Verve Pipe could have been one of the best-loved band in america. they went in many musical directions on their first four albums [especially on their second and fourth], and did it all well. from fast and bitter ["Bullies on Vacation," "Television," "I've Suffered a Head Injury"] to deep and introspective ["She Has Faces," "The River," "Acting as Your Slave"] to downright youthful ["Generations," "Real," "Even the Score"]--the band never got hopelessly tied to any mood or style, and could do all of them well. the lyrics, as well, were masterful: they were intelligent, and they painted honest emotional pictures.
a lingering disappointment
i'm still very bitter about their fifth album, Underneath, and have been since it came out in 2001. that was the last real studio album the band put out--and it was terrible. it symbolized capitulation. it was pop of the worst kind. instead of testing the stylistic and emotional expanses of the form as the band did in Pop Smear and The Verve Pipe, it contained an attempt to release an album full of radio-friendly "adult alternative" hits. just as any attempt to crank out an album full of palatable music fails...this album failed. sure, the band chanced upon a huge adult radio hit with "The Freshmen," but it was just that: chance. the song was a heart-wrenching portrait of something very painful. it had genuine emotion. it wasn't written way back in 1992 to please millions of listeners: it was the product of some inspiration. it just happened to strike a chord with a lot of people a few years later.
Underneath abandoned the interest, the excitement, and the sense of genre-busting adventure that made the self-titled album so brilliant. on the other hand, it also failed to produce the radio hit that the entire album was so clearly a plea for. "Never Let You Down" got a few spins and "Colorful" was in the movie Rock Star, but nothing ever even skirted the commercial success of "The Freshmen." the songs didn't contain the emotional power of the band's previous work. many of the songs dripped with sap. they felt like love songs for the sake of love songs, as opposed to love songs because the person who wrote it was really that moved by love. and...the album disappeared. as dumb as a lot of the music-consuming public may be, people instinctively know the difference between a truly sentimental song and a song that is sappy only because someone behind it thought it would play well in the top 40.
maybe that album just took me by surprise. i thought that if they were ever going to release That Pandering Album, it would come out right after Villains. it didn't. after Villains came The Verve Pipe--an album just as varied, edgy, and devil-may-care as Pop Smear, the genre-spanning indie release from 1993. the self-titled album was a masterpiece, a collection that, if i didn't know better, i could have sworn had been made by several bands that specified in several kinds of music. i thought the band didn't care about convention. i thought they'd keep ignoring the whims of the music brass and keep making the diverse music they had been making for nigh on ten years by then.
i don't know what happened, or why. maybe i neglected to take into account the feelings of immortality that fame brings and the feelings of desperation that can set in as fame fades. The Verve Pipe didn't produce any real radio hits. "Hero" got played a few times because it was the first single, but it never really caught on. the album wasn't very accessible to radio. maybe someone thought that they needed to recapture that radio success, and do everything that was within their power to try. i don't know...this is all conjecture from a fan who holds the bands she loves to a far higher standard than the bands she does not love, because she knows what they can do.
that's enough about that album: in short, Underneath disappointed me, and i am still bitter. i'd be less bitter if they had just charged on and continued to make studio albums after Underneath. it would have softened the sting, or made me forget it altogether, if they had released another rich, interesting studio album at some point between 2001 and now. but, they haven't. they haven't released any true new album since then.
the show
i finally have something to salve my frustrations of the last six years. The Verve Pipe is mostly broken up: they get together every december and play some shows around the midwest, and that's it. this year i finally managed to make a show on that tour: my first Verve Pipe concert ever. and...it was wonderful. the band sounded great, at least as good as on any studio track they ever put out. the songs had more than enough energy to reach from their unfortunate perch above the bar all the way out to every member of the crowd. Brian Vander Ark's voice had not aged a bit. Doug Corella, the keyboard player, had a rig perfectly suited to the brilliant jack-of-all-trades that he is: a keyboard, a large cymbal on each side of the keyboard, and a drumset off to the side of the keyboard.
they played these songs:
- Photograph
- Cup of Tea
- Hero
- Spoonful of Sugar
- at first i wasn't sure about having a harmonica solo in this song, but strangely enough...it worked.
- I Want All of You
- Gotta Move On
- Villains
- Drive You Mild
- Colorful
- a sarcastic medley of covers
- most of the snippets i didn't recognize. there was a snippet of "Hotel California" in the middle. also...the final snippet was hilarious: Brian Vander Ark as Carol Channing trying to sing John Mayer's "Your Body Is A Wonderland." i wish i had gotten a video or audio clip of that, because only in hearing it can you really appreciate how funny that was.
- Never Let You Down
- The Freshmen
- after "Never Let You Down" i jotted down in my notebook that i would give the band a cookie if they played any songs from I've Suffered a Head Injury. they then played "The Freshmen": a song which was retooled and put on Villains--but was originally on Suffered. i remarked that they could have a cookie on a technicality--but gratefully, they played the song Villains-style, with electric guitars and a rich full-band arrangement.
- Happiness Is
- Take the Long Way Home
- in the middle of this song, Brian turned his back to the crowd and stood in front of Doug's rig. he had a tambourine in one hand and a drumstick in the other. with the drumstick, he was whaling on Doug's cymbals. it was fabulous.
- encore: Local Boys
the show did teach me a valuable lesson: not every song from Underneath was a clunker. two of the songs on there can, at least live, hold their own with anything else The Verve Pipe has ever performed. "Gotta Move On" was haunting; the lead guitar alone was enough to rip my heart right out of my chest. i could just feel the heartbreak, and there was nothing boring or merely palatable about that song. it was real. the encore, "Local Boys," just rocked. it had a great beat and energy to it...and the lyrics made the song feel like a less-jaded, more mature sequel to "Supergig" from the self-titled album. i'm still no fan of Underneath, but the concert did make me appreciate those two songs a lot.
i got some pictures of the set...although most of them are not very good. the stage lighting was terrible for anyone who wanted to get pictures of anyone who wasn't right up front, since there was almost no light anywhere else. i couldn't get near enough to the stage for the flash to make much of a difference, since the stage was twelve feet in the air. so, i got some almost-clear pictures of Brian and of Griff the Harmonica Solo Guy, but no one else came out very clear in any of them. this made me sad: i wanted good stage pictures of Brian Vander Ark, Donny Brown, and Doug Corella, the three band members remaining from when i was in high school. Brian was right up front, but Donny was back on drums and Doug was back on percussion. they never looked like anything but shadows in any of my shots.
the people
the band was mostly, although not completely, intact from the old days. as i said, three members remained from the early nineties: Brian, Donny, and Doug. Brian and Donny have been in the band since its inception in 1992 and have co-written and played songs on every album. they have been the driving creative forces behind the band, and it would just not be The Verve Pipe anymore if either of them left the band. Doug was not in the band for I've Suffered a Head Injury, but joined for Pop Smear in 1993 and has been in the band ever since. he has played keyboard, percussion, drums...he's the bands brilliant multi-instrumentalist jack of all trades.
the rest of the band is new. it was very weird seeing someone other than Brad Vander Ark playing bass and someone other than A.J. Dunning playing lead guitar. they were played instead by two guys i did not recognize. i didn't know their names. they were never introduced during the show, and i can't even seem to find them on the band's website or in the message boards. i couldn't complain at all about their instrumental proficiency--the songs sounded just like the songs i knew and loved. i was just a little unsettled by not recognizing all of the faces on stage, the same way i always am when a band i have loved for a very long time has a personnel change.
and then, there was Griff, the harmonica guy. that was weird. i was a little confused seeing a harmonica player up there because The Verve Pipe never had harmonicas in any of their songs on the studio albums. even though some of the solos dragged on far longer than they needed to, they were well-done...there were harmonica parts in four or five of the songs, and each worked nicely with the original idea of the song and what the rest of the band was playing.
concert as context for self-overanalysis
the harmonica player brought me my first realisation of the stark difference between my outlook in seeing The Verve Pipe at age twenty-five compared to what it would have been when i was in high school. during one of the songs about midway through the show, i got up for a drink. i picked it up from the bar, turned back toward my seat, and then saw him near the door talking to someone. i strolled over there and told him he did a good job with the "Spoonful of Sugar" solo.
he cut me off as i was finishing, and asked me what my shirt said. i told him--i was wearing my "feelings are boring. kissing is awesome." shirt. he then leaned in to give me a kiss. i guess i was asking for it by wearing that shirt, so i let him give me a chaste peck, and then i quickly shuffled back to my table to take in the rest of the concert in peace.
i then got to thinking: in itself, the event was totally forgettable. i wore a snarky shirt, someone reacted to it in the expected way, and then i went along with my life. but, my high school self would not have reacted that way. if some guy who had been on stage with the verve pipe had tried to kiss me when i was in high school, even if he had not been a full-fledged or original band member, i would have been over the moon. it would have been a defining moment for me. i would have written endlessly about it in my notebooks. there would have been copious amounts of bad teenage poetry about the event. i would have written excitedly about the event to my pen pal and to all the TVP-loving teenagers i talked to online every night. everyone i knew would have been very sick of my ranting and raving.
but, it happened at age twenty-five and not age fourteen or sixteen. it was only remarkable for pointing out how i have changed over the last ten years. i've become far more jaded and realistic about certain events. if there is no real meaning behind them, i am willing to admit that...whereas, when i was fourteen, the slightest eye contact, hug, or anything else from a person in a band was enough to make me read everything into it.
the aftermath
after the concert came one of the most surreal moments of my entire life. most of the band went over by the merch booth to meet fans and sign autographs. even when i was a teenager, i was never prone to being starstruck in front of rockers. there's a difference between being starstruck and the actual problem of blowing incidents out of proportion that i had when i was a teenager. when i was at the concert venue, i was fine: i could meet musicians i loved, carry on intelligent conversations with them, and only later become too giddy about the event to function. i would later run the encounter through my head so many times that it became an almost fictionalized paragon of the actual event--but during the encounter, i was level-headed. i wasn't a gibbering idiot.
thursday night after the concert, i finally fell victim to being starstruck. i met both Brian and Donny after the show, and all i could think of to say was that i had been a fan for over ten years, that it was my first show, and that their music got me through so much in high school. i was nervous, i was shaking, and i kept repeating myself. i did have the presence of mind to ask if they'd be in pictures with me...but, as you can see from the ear-to-ear grin on my face, i was completely overwhelmed with glee from finally meeting members of The Verve Pipe:
me and Brian:
Brian, me, and Donny:
Brian and Donny were nice...i just wish i could have thought of something intelligent to say to them after the show.
the end
so, i have spent most of this time dwelling upon the negative, the absurd, and my bizarre reactions to finally seeing my favourite band from my teenage years many years later. i didn't mean to do that, because it downplays the overwhelming feeling i had when i left the Voodoo Lounge on thursday night: that the concert was amazing, and something about my life finally felt complete once i got to see them. it made me proud all over again to be a fan of The Verve Pipe. i just don't think i had ever completely hashed out my feelings about them since i left high school, so my last seven years of intermittently thinking about the band never really congealed or came flowing out in any coherent manner until now.
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