A Fulfilled Life in Utopia-Land (Old Myspace Blog from 2/12/07)

After listening to Guns 'n Roses classic album "Appetite for Destruction" constantly for the past week and a half (meaning that I have listened to no other album with only one night's necessary exception), I realized that it's time to move on. Today I went with REM's "Murmur" which offered a nice paradox with its lullaby verses and "take my breath away" choruses. I don't know how they did that album. It befuddles me to listen to it because every song is perfect, in perfect placement, creating a perfect mood. But back to Guns n' Roses.

This week has afforded me not time to think but rather time to not think. I mastered the Axl Rose snake dance (the key is raising your arms above your head rather than keeping them down low. Or at bare minimum to pretend you're holding a microphone stand, but then the spin move is necessary...), organized a "best to worst" list of songs off "Appetite" as follows...

1. Rocket Queen
2. Mr. Brownstone
3. It's so Easy
4. Out ta Get Me
5. Nightrain
6. My Michelle
7. You're Crazy
8. Welcome to the Jungle
9. Paradise City
10. Think about You
11. Anything Goes
12. Sweet Child o Mine

The toughest parts of this list were definitely the "Rocket Queen" vs. "Mr. Brownstone" debate. Brownstone has the sentimental factor where R. Queen is the far better song. I've given it a sentimental factor since living in Strasbourg, so I decided on that, though my friends back home would hate me for it. The other toughie was "Welcome to the Jungle" vs. "Paradise City"... both are great songs, yet they suffer from being overplayed. I went with "Jungle" because, though being less anthemic, it delivers a punch even to this day, 19 years after I first heard it. "You know where you are?"For a profound experience, follow this link to see the Axl Rose snake dance in all its glory. This is "Rocket Queen" live. The voice, the stage presence, everything makes me wish I could have been born about seven years earlier so I would have gone to see shows like this.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a0OxjoD0LpM

Before I get too far off track, this experiment proved successful on many levels. I've often wondered if one can think too much. I look at the passive observers of life with profound disdain, wondering how it is that they constantly slide idly by without delving into the heart of the madness and chaos and ridiculousness of existence. Never does there exist a wanton need to destroy the complacency of existence? Usually not. But strangely, by turning off the melencholy droning of the depressive music that usually fills my brain, I became fulfilled. The challenge was accepted, and with it, I found the rebirth that I had been striving for all weelk.The key moment came during a concert. The Molodoi in Strasbourg could only be compared to the Fireside Bowl in Chicago. Since the Fireside Bowl no longer exists, I'll have to try to paint the picture. This place frightened me. I saw people hanging from the ceilings, throwing amplifiers into the audience, smashing microphones, etc. The most bizarre night at the Fireside came during a Locust concert where one guy stood in the middle of the pit with his hands cupped at ankle level. People would run toward him, land a foot on his cupped hands, and get tossed onto the stage. I was between the tosser and the stage and had to constantly be wary of getting a Doc Marten to the nugget. The Locust plays the most violent brand of indecipherable noise metal that my ears have ever been blessed to hear. But I was terrified. The guy next to me was doing karate... solely because he couldn't help it. The violence of the music drove the crowd to violence. Some guy decided that he didn't like where I was standing, so he picked me up like a man-child-belt-buckle-baby, ran me to the other side of the room (about 200 feet away), and dropped me to the ground, running back laughing. This made me incredibly angry. I was embarrassed because I was trying to slightly impress the girl I was with by being tough enough to stand in the middle of the chaos, even though all I wanted to do was go outside and vomit. I couldn't take the violence all around me... not because I'm weak (I generally seek out the worst place to stand at freak out concerts) but because it was far too out of control. Here's a sample concert of theirs... though the one I went to was far more out of control.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QiCXINpXG6U

The Molodoi was housing a travelling festival of punk rock bands and strange short films. The tour had just gone through Germany and was making its first French stop in Strasbourg. I was quite excited to go because I love weird short films and abrasive music. I went with my friend Carole who is kind enough to put up with my complete inability to speak French. She stumbles through her English and doesn't mind that I have all but completely given up my willingness to even practice my French. I'm too careful with my words to resort to being a cave man or Tim Allen type person. I need to "articulate exactitude", not stutter through a pointless conversation. Plus, she seems to think that English will help her with her job. So, in a way, I guess, I'm helping her.

I started the night out by giving her a present that she didn't see coming in a million years. We had a discussion the previous week about her favorite animal, the Icelandic puffin. Since then it became a bit of a rubber chicken, in that we brought the puffin into coversation whenever there was an awkward lag. "I bet that's the kind of movie a puffin would like, ha ha". But she also mentioned that she couldn't find cool, small buttons, the kind that go on jean jackets or the thick strap of purses (not that I would know about that). I took the effort to track down the perfect button... a puffin button which she stated "does not exist". I gave her the button, and she responded with, "buht, zees es impossible! You could not have found the poofin bootin!" I like doing nice things for people like that, where you catch them completely off guard. My mother did that once for me... she called it Christmas in July and got me a gigantic lego set that I had been eyeing for some time. It's my thought that Christmas would have a whole lot more meaning if it were given at random points in the year rather than always the same day. I guess there would be some religious implications to this, though.So we went to the concert. The first band frightened me. They were big guys with huge voices. They sang like "grroooohhhhhooohhhhhhhooooo" and no words made sense. They could have been from France, Germany, the US, China, or Mars for all I knew. The crowd was violent right off the bat. I was out of place. Within the first five minutes a drink was spilled down my sweater by a passerby that didn't even look back to acknowledge his crime. I soaked it up with my scarf; Carole gave me a sympathetic frown; I knew I couldn't let it bother me because spilled drinks don't bother people at punk concerts.

The movies were great. Even though they weren't "good" in the pure sense of the word, they were entertaining.

Top five movie moments during the festival.

1. My apartment in Strasbourg was actually used for one of the films! It featured several "Pere Noels" rope climbing up the side of my building into the window of one of the apartments. Then they messed around a bit on the inside and slid, one by one, down the bannisters. I was suspicious at this point, but I didn't say anything. Then they showed the foyer and the front door, and I freaked out. "Chez moi!" I yelled to Carole. She agreed, but wasn't convinced. Then they listed the address in the credits. It was a very strange feeling.

2. The film I most enjoyed was a dystopian short feature from (I think) Greece. It was about a guy that is about to be exterminated because he is losing faith in his place in the world. The greatest line from it was delivered by a computer. "Increased faith and productivity will lead to a fulfilled life in Utopia-land". I thought that phrase would make the greatest fortune cookie fortune ever! Eventually (after trying to pray and make haste with his work) he is exterminated. No Utopia-Land for you!

3. Then there was the Vampire vs. Zombie debate. During a vampire film, I made the mistake of calling the creatures of the night, zombies. "Noh, zey are not zompies! Zey ahr the vampires!" I asked Carole if she would rather be a zombie or a vampire. She stated she'd rahter be a zombie which got me bothered for some reason. I told her that zombies exist solely to convert other people to zombiehood, much like those people that go door to door trying to religiously convert people. The vampire has style and elegance. I would want to be a vampire. The simple fact that a zombie can be taken out with a shovel, yet vampires need to be taken out with extreme measures ( silver bullet, crucifix, garlic, etc) makes them far cooler. The Misfit's song "Astro Zombies" is far superior to their other song "Vampira", but that doesn't make so much of a difference. I brought this up at least six other times in the night ("I just don't understand why you would choose to be a zombie!") and I never got convinced.

4. There was a piece called "Ego" where a cartoon man tried to fight himself off in the mirror. He entered the mirror and chased his mirrored image around a strange universe. He killed the image by cracking it on the head where he had initially cracked his mirror. This held some profound meaning for me.

5. There was a movie called "Revenge of the Zombies" which was only funny because it reinstated the zombie debate.

The second band to come on was labeled as "Chicago Noise" though they were from Germany. They did have that distinct Chicago sound. They were my favorite of the night, riotous, tight, and sort of goofy. A new debate ensued with Carole when she asked me who was on the drummer's tee shirt. I confidently replied "AC Slater" from Saved by the Bell. She hadn't heard of it, but after further discussion, she realized it was the same as a show called, " sauvé par le gong" in France. Same characters and everything. She still was unconvinced. I said we should bet on it, so we did. I was totally positive that Mario Lopez' afro-mullet was staring back at me, but I was wrong. I asked the guy after the show, and he told me that it was a German singer from the sixties. Can't remember his name. I told Carole that she won the bet but that we forgot to bet anything. She said, "So I veen nothing?" and I told her "yes". That's how it goes. Here's a video of AC Slater doing what he does best.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qSF1brtyHdA

Hey, they work!!!!

The next band was the one that got me thinking. Now, I had turned off all intellectual thought to the best of my ability for about one week. It was looming in my head, and I couldn't help but let the third band of the night hit me across the jaw a bit. This band (not sure of their name) outdid the Locust in terms of noise obnoxiousness. I'd never heard a racket like this one. They played massively loud guitars as hard as human hands can muster. The female vocalist's voice sounded like a blender on "frappé". She claimed that she was losing it from the difficult touring, but it still was one of the most powerful throats I'd ever heard. The thing that got me about it was that I knew these five people that were onstage had been waiting for this moment--this moment to scream their heads off and play their instruments with precise, wreckless abandon--the entire day. They didn't want to do anything else--this wasn't their job, this was their release. I couldn't help but compare these people on stage, that couldn't even control themselves enough to stay on stage, to the world outside the Molodoi. I have a feeling that everyone has inside them the same thing that this band expressed. I wonder deeply why it is that so few ever express pure, unadulterated passion with the voices they've been given. I realize that a man screaming on the street corner would appear to be crazy and locked up in the looney bin, but can't there be something. The crowd got a bit of it by simply being near it. It was different for me because usually I go into the middle of the chaos, oftentimes unable to control myself from getting onstage with the band. Yet, here I was off to the side, watching the chaos from afar. Chaos is a word I've been exploring quite a lot lately. This has to do with the fact that Mr. Henry Miller is deeply imbedded in my craw, and his words are shaking my core. As I tried NOT to think all week, I had a profound thought. I need to watch the chaos of the world from afar, keep myself on the fringe but never inside it, and allow the chaos to be a permanent cloud on my insides while never effecting my personal demeanor. I hate people that stand still at concerts, though.

I want to be a passive observer in this life. No longer do I want to worry about war, disease, starving children in Africa. I want to breathe! Of course the misery of the world is bothersome, and I'll do all there is to help it in my own small way, but in reality should I let it depress me? Should I let my country, government, school, job, culture, social standing, family, friends, associates, coworkers, roommate, telemarketers, etc. really have any say in how I feel? I think not. Because the chaos may be in the Middle East, Africa, New Orleans, anywhere. It was present at the Molodoi that night, for sure. I watched it. I felt the chaos around me and I felt a far more important feeling. With the reverberations of the music, I felt the chaos within myself, and that is the chaos which I want to delve into, head first. Most likely, this is a move as moronic as jumping into a swimming pool without water, but I'll do it.Later in the night, the guitarist played his guitar on top of the crowd, meaning that he was supported by the audience. This was exciting, especially as he drew closer and closer to me. I raised one hand and shoved his shoulder in the other direction. This trip has afforded me the opportunity to learn about myself. I don't want to make it seem as though I'm becoming an egotistical nihilist, but I simply don't want the futility of the chaos of the world to bring me down to its level. The chaos of the world is eternal, inevitable, and one dimensional--it's always going to be war, poverty, disaster, hate; the chaos of my soul will dun itself upon my heart and mind only as long as I'm alive. It's fully impossible to digest, but at least I can enjoy the butterflies.