008: Big hats everywhere

I'm having one of those selfish mornings where the only thing i can think about is how things inconvenience me. Tragedies and catastrophes I can handle. An earthquake in Haiti, a tyrant on capital hill, life goes on. But if I miss the bus on a Thursday morning? Ugh!

I did miss the bus. I took too long getting ready, because after work last night dad had left me some leftovers. I didn't need them, but it was a roast for crying out loud, how could I say no? So I decided I'm gonna pack up my leftovers with some bread and make a sandwich for lunch, but I might as well keep it separate because I've got to microwave the meat. By the time I get out there to the bus stop, the bus had already passed, and I waited until quarter to until it dawned on me. And I felt like an idiot anyway, because the paper I had skipped class yesterday to write was still sitting on my printer tray. So it's a good thing I missed the bus. Missing the bus was good. This entire ordeal shouldn't have occurred, I should've put the paper in my backpack the night before, but I'm glad I didn't get on that bus, because apparently late papers are not accepted in that class.

Oh, that class. Love-hate. So conflicted. There's a lot of interesting perspective that goes into it, there are worse things to study, it's good. As with many papers I was rethinking my entire piece long after the point was moot, but anyway. I really start to hate the class at 11:55 when there's five minutes left and the prof shows no signs of stopping, or wrapping up. He has a train of thought problem, he goes on and on at his own pace without much organization, and when he's still got a lot to say with the minutes ticking down and a room full of 300 students shuffling anxiously, zipping backpacks, closing notebooks, and he's just about to make what could very well be his final point, except not, and he's repeating himself... you get the idea.

Plus, I was late. Obviously. I missed the bus, so I walked to the station and caught the 9:30, which made me about a half hour late to class. Had to hand in my paper at the end, which is why I was squirming. I just really wanted to go. So crowded.

So I had to get to Pratt and get this out there, to vent, not stew on it. I have enough inconveniences in my life, living the way I do. I just accept them and try to find zen.

I've been thinking about Nirvana lately (talk about a bizarre segue, I mean the band this time.) There was an FML a few days ago where some dude wanted the same car as Kurt Cobain, but discovered he couldn't in good conscience because it is also the same car as Edward in Twilight. I made the mistake (I should've known better) of glancing at the comments to this particular FML, which derided Cobain as, among other things, a hack.

Now, see here. There's a lot you can say about Cobain. You don't even have to like his music. But hack? To call Cobain a hack is to misunderstand the entire concept of what a hack is. A hack is somebody who makes a living appealing to the lowest common denominator, who shuns originality in favour of whatever will make a quick buck. Stephenie Myers is a hack. You don't have to love Cobain, but if nothing else, he strove for originality, to play his music his way. A hack wouldn't have written Sliver or Rape Me; a hack wouldn't have covered Where Did You Sleep Last Night or The Man Who Sold the World. I'm way more of a hack than Cobain was, and I don't see myself as a hack. Hack my ass.

You can call him a druggy, a suicide case, a failure (in that he failed to keep living and endure life's despair -- some real Hamlet shit there.) I posted the link on Twitter and my colleague Blake responded wondering whether it was even the best idea to want to emulate Cobain. I replied summarily, "Hey, it's not like he wanted the same brand of syringes or shotgun."

Can't look to musicians as role models, folks. If you only enjoy music made by morally upstanding people, you probably have shitty taste in music. Even Karen Carpenter was an anorexic. And I don't care for the Carpenters' music, but she did have a hell of a voice and it's tragic what happened to her. The Beatles were pot heads after being amphetamine pill poppers and before being LSD space-cases. Bing Crosby was a child abuser, the Rat Pack was made exclusively of alcoholics. I haven't even mentioned Michael Jackson, and HEY DID YOU KNOW THE FATHER OF THE FIRST BOY TO ACCUSE HIM ADMITTED IT WAS A SCAM?? Armed with that bit of information I could've ended numerous summertime arguments about his morals. he was weird looking, had a plastic surgery addiction and a major Peter Pan complex. "He diddled kids" some drunk dude harangued me for even thinking to defend him; he was acquitted. Phil Spector is a murderer. A fucking murderer, he was convicted. A terrible human being, but I don't boycott his records.

Six months later I'm still having this argument.

I think it's because in recent years, now that we're nearly 2 decades removed from the initial success of Nirvana, Cobain & Co. are starting to be looked at in those reverent critical circles reserved for the sacred halls of rock, your Lennons, your Elvises, your Jaggers. And a lot of people resent that, because a lot of people don't care for Nirvana, don't get what the fuss is about.

I've talked about that phenomenon before. When a large group of people -- people you don't typically disagree with -- love something you don't. And you feel compelled to scream out "You're wrong, it's not good, it's not!!" Like the film geeks who hate Charlie Kaufman. They look at their cinephile brethren and see admiration for these works that simply do not understand, and maybe they feel betrayed. Only Sane Man complex. it can't be you, it must be everyone else. the erstwhile TV columnist in Metro was an obnoxious case of this, with politics as much as entertainment. I guess that explains the erst.

So a lover of rock and roll sees the hagiography of Cobain and thinks "This is madness! What did he do that was so special?" And it's just like Louie Armstrong said. "There are some people that if they don't know, you can't tell them." I love that quote, it nails down the intuitiveness of, well, everything. If you've heard Sliver and you don't understand, if you've listened to their Unplugged album and you still sniff and say "Soundgarden was better, Alice in Chains was better," then you're not getting it. I don't know much about those bands, I don't mean to deride those bands. They're probably very good and have endured a lot of consideration, but there's a reason Nirvana looms large. Who fucking writes a song where the chorus is a screaming plead of "Grandma take me home, Grandma take me home!" There's a good deal of literary theory in that: Consider Jakobsen. Don't mind if I do. There's the content, the form, the sound of the message. What is being said and how it is being conveyed, and what it is really intended to mean. Brilliant. Drain You. What a lyric: "It is not my duty to completely drain you" with a catchy tune and distorted guitars.

But if you haven't already figured this out, I may be wasting my time trying to explain it. If the music doesn't move you, it doesn't move you, and that's the brilliance of it. But you're not going to help anybody by trying to convince them otherwise: they've made up their minds, too. You just look like a lunatic. Like that guy in Invasion of the Body Snatchers. "Don't you understand?? They're already here -- critically appraising In Utero!!"

I like this topic. I told a girl recently I could talk on and on about music (or movies or TV) endlessly. Mostly I'm talking out of my ass, but it's fun to watch, I should think. I'm hammering away passionately at the keyboard here in Pratt the way few do. The girl in question, I met on POF. I have no intentions. She's in Waterloo and long distance is so far beyond a bad idea for me right now. I just saw her profile, she had a photo of her with a log, and all I wanted to say was "Nice log." If only she'd been among the majority of girls who don't reply to me. But lines like "Nice log" don't come along very often. Mostly I just try to be charming and end up coming off as creepy.

I could go on about that. In fact, I did, but I deleted it, because that's a rant for another time. Let's just say that my standing with the opposite sex is a little more complicated lately, and that I don't mind.

At Robyn's behest, I e-mailed Alicia. At this point, it's not necessarily about the girl, but what she represents. About not quitting too soon, about trying to make things work out. I have absolutely no faith that she will actually respond, but at least I tried. And now I can move on and get back to being happy being single, instead of being miserable about it.

Damnit, I've come this close to ranting about it again. better cut myself off.

Keep on rockin'
-Scotto