Life's Rich Tapestry
Hey readers. It's Jim again. Cultural critic for South Carolina's fine print digest The Cousin, and guest columnist for the OxStu.
Music been on the mind this week, and my listenin' has been getting real diverse. Normally I like my melody on the cutting edge, but lately my Terpsicorean dream has became more of a noirish nightmare. And why? Because of Nu-Metal, that's why. Is there any other musical form so dominated by fat 40-somethings with flavour-saving beards and zero talent? Maybe Austrian harpsicord Baroque. But you get my point.
Corpulent thrash-rockers really get my goat. 'Specially Slipknot, who (for those who don't know or care) wear dumb rubber masks to let us normal folks know how spooky they are. A goddamn juvenile bunch. No wonder their nancy-boy headbangin' looks like a potty-training infant on a well-oiled rocking horse.
Whine. That's all them goths ever do. This other band are called System of Down. Syndrome of Down, more like. The lead-singer goes in for atonal moaning, mostly lines like 'I need my / Self-righteous suicide'. So why doesn't he take one for the team and wrap his lips round a shotgun. I'm sure his ape toes can reach the trigger and put both barrels through his craw.
I sympathise with his rage, folks. Such shouty anger comes straight out of our shocking state school system. Groups who never fit in are pushed to the sidelines by the burly sports-types. And I know it hurts.
Another oppressed minority at my school-house were them Bangladeshi kids. Their grandpoppas built the railroad, and they've been around ever since. But now they power the nation's economy by sellin' beef jerky and canned goods. All goddamn heroes far as this reporter is concerned, but school never opened up to the new neighbours. They shut us out in return. My kids call 'em the 'Asian Snub Foundation'. I don't get it.
Hey, I'm sure thrash rockers had the crap kicked out of 'em in the schoolyard. But you don't see me and my Bangladeshi pals playing drums with our cocks and humpin' chickens. No matter how loud you scream about black angels, blood rage and cruciform penile piercings, you just ain't getting' that lunch money back. Let go, dammit. Be a wise-ass journalist instead. Make grown-up bullies pump your gas or gravel your driveway. Belittle them at every turn, but leave the goth froth behind. Ex-bullies ain't scared by facial hair and split-ends. They see their wives every day.
Anyhow, Nu-Metal will be written out of music history once everyone hears of the most exciting new genre since skiffle: Country Rap. Why even as I write, the sweet jingle-jangle of 'Gin and Juice' by Phish rolls over me, with guest vocals from Snoop Dogg. What a record. Pathos, poetry and bad bitches sculpted into 3-and-a-quarter minutes of even-tempo genius. I'm moseying down to the Cricketers' Arms tonight to catch their secret gig. Come along, why don'tcha. In Snoop's immortal words: 'We'll get a drink on, and a smoke on, then go find sumthin to poke on.' Damn, this countrified rhymin' is not just for an age, but for all time.
18th Oct 2001