With one more month of unbearable humidity ahead of us and nearly two months of rest and relaxation behind us it is time to look back and reflect. Although truth be told my summer hasn’t borne much rest and relaxation. It was Homer Simpson who said, “When you get a job like me you’ll miss every summer.” As it is, I take a moment to reflect on my summer – my summer and its lack of writing. Murmur took a brief hiatus, and I took an even longer hiatus as one thing led to another. To make up for it I believe I owe everyone a mix.

This year’s summer mix is called “Vibrations In the Air Have to Come From Somewhere.” I set out assembling these songs back in May with modest determination. I had recently overdrawn my checking account for the millionth-ma-billionth time, after I spent two months under the impression that I was fiscally all right, and I’d be damned if I let the man keep me from having fun this summer.

The first half of these songs reflect that attitude. “Bankrobber” is the type of Clash you listen to while you grill barbecued pineapple hamburgers with your best friends Memorial Day weekend, and “To Be Someone (Didn’t We Have a Nice Time)” is the Jam reminding me I’m screwed. Then about halfway through May I had the worst week of my life. Anyone who follows Murmur or looks in the links will know what happened. The summer mix completely changed gears, and I let it go because you have to let the mix speak its own language. A mix is like a self-portrait of the person assembling it. How do you feel at a given moment? How does your music logically arrange itself in a way that best illustrates a few weeks in your life? This mix is what it is – two halves of time and space – and I love it. I hope you love it, too.

Vibrations In the Air Have To Come From Somewhere – Summer 2010

1) Bankrobber (Robber Dub) – the Clash

2) One By One – the Black Seeds

3) Mother Earth – Memphis Slim

4) Singer Songwriter – Okkervil River

5) Empty Heart – Wolf People

6) To Be Someone (Didn’t We Have A Nice Time) – the Jam

7) William It Was Really Nothing – the Smiths

Big Boys – Elvis Costello and the Attractions

9) The Mall and Misery – Broken Bells

10) The Predatory Wasp of the Palisades Is Out To Get Us! – Sufjan Stevens

11) Temptation Inside Your Heart – The Velvet Underground

12) Combat Rock – Sleater-Kinney

13) Do You Want New Wave Or Do You Want the Truth – Minutemen

14) Planetary – Rainer Maria

15) Burn 2 Ash – Chad Van Gaalen

16) Start A War – the National

17) Functionality – Pylon

(It stinks that the song where I got this mix’s title has no videos on the internet. This is a short video of Pylon, the greatest of all Athens bands past and present. Go out and get ‘Gyrate’ right now.)

‘Boxer’ may have been the single most overrated album of the Twenty-first century’s first decade, and the National may have been the single most overrated band. I gave up trying to like ‘Boxer’ because it wasn’t going to happen, and I wasn’t going to kid myself. I formed my opinion, and yes it is a negative opinion, but no one can say I didn’t give ‘Boxer’ a chance. I’m fair, but I’m also honest.

The words we say, be they the casual happenstance of every day conversation or the semi-formal declarations we feel entitled to make on the internet, are meaningless. It is impossible to see the future or to even comprehend the paths weaving concurrently to our own that will one day intersect us. Chance encounters in which we reiterate opinions posted elsewhere have nothing to do with what happens a week later. Even if they do, there is no way for us to know. We say what we say because of what unfolds immediately before us. In a future moment you look back and wonder what a past moment, if directed differently, could have yielded. There is no correct answer, just as there is no blame to shoulder and absolutely no dignified fulfillment to ‘what might have been.’ The suddenness of reality bears down once this fact becomes vivid, and when faced with the overwhelming shadow of truth all you can do is cry on the bathroom floor.

I last saw my friend Kim on May 15. I pulled into the parking lot of the coffee shop that employs me and saw a green Hyundai. ‘That looks like Kim’s car,’ I mused to myself, and I parked next to it, engaged in my typical prework ritual of listening to music until I’ve unwound enough to face another day. Sunset Rubdown was playing, and I settled into the driver’s seat, closed my eyes, and heard a knock on my passenger side window. ‘Oh, it was Kim’s car.’ I rolled down the window as Kim waved, and after I said hello the first thing out of her mouth was, “Do you know why you don’t like the National? Because their lyrics suck.”

What followed was a lengthy but casual conversation about the new National album, ‘High Violet,’ and how we felt it compared to their earlier work. I repeated my opinion from the review I wrote a few weeks ago, that ‘High Violet’ was a grower, that it wasn’t going to ignite until somewhere in the middle of the album, and that I like that so much more than ‘Boxer.’ Kim’s stance was firm, though. She told me she never liked Matt Berninger’s lyrics, that “I’m going to eat your brains” is one of the lamest phrases she’s ever heard, that she has no time for something so flimsy. All of this seemed odd to me since I remembered her deeply in love with ‘Boxer.’ I kept talking about ‘Boxer,’ and I believe my exact words were, “I stopped kidding myself. You know? It wasn’t going to happen. It was just one of those things. Time to move on.”

We kept talking, and I got Kim thinking about “I came to Ohio on a swarm of bees.” Maybe I made some headway for her to like ‘High Violet.’ We parted ways a little bit later as I went into work and Kim went to meet another friend of ours. I worked my shift that day and five other shifts the following week, and I thought about Kim a lot. I thought about how sporadically I see her, and I thought about how I love seeing her because we have conversations just like that when we do run into each other, be it at a party or out somewhere unexpected. It was just a part of life, that conversation and all the other conversations we have. I lived and I worked as I always do.

A week later, a week to the day and maybe even the hour, I got a call from the friend who Kim went to meet after our parking lot encounter. Kim killed herself on May 21. The days following that phone call were numb. Everyone talks about numbness when facing shock. I had no idea what it felt like until I experienced it. The only word to describe it is numb, and nothing more can be said to further illustrate it. Just know that you don’t want to feel it. Yesterday afternoon I had my first honest to God cry over this mess, and while the ship is starting to right itself I don’t think it will ever be on a perfectly even keel again. Everything I saw and experienced last week has guaranteed that nothing will ever be the same. Wherever Kim is now, no matter how much I want to go after her, I can’t. It’s a bitch, that barrier between the now and the nether, but both halves are equally real and equally intangible. And we all have our place.

Wednesday evening last week we were together at Kim’s mother’s house, talking about Kim, remembering Kim, laughing and crying when we needed to. It was late, and I had to work early the next morning, but just being there and listening to these stories, chiming in when I had to, it was the first good time I’d had in four days. Smiling and laughing again when I hadn’t cried at all, not yet anyway. I thought I could face this thing and get over it. Then the conversation went from one thing to another, and suddenly I’m hearing Kim’s sister say, “The last song she listened to was ‘Start a War’ by the National.” My brain passed through a black hole. I was everywhere and nowhere and I needed to be somewhere else, so I ran. We were actually talking about this. We were talking about the last song Kim listened to. Not only that, but the last song Kim listened to was directly related to the last conversation I ever had with Kim.

I am not an idiot. I don’t think anything I said that afternoon had any bearing on the choices Kim made. Nor do I think anything I could have said would have made things happen differently. The paths were already weaving just beyond our comprehension, and while I also don’t believe in predestination I also know there was nothing I could do. But the topic of our last conversation was the last band that Kim ever listened to. That’s just haunting to me. All of these unanswered questions – was she already thinking about this when we were talking? Did the National mean that much to her? I can’t answer these questions and I don’t want to. But where does that leave me? I’m stuck with the memory of dry May heat on a Saturday afternoon, sitting in my black car with sticky hot black upholstery sucking up hot air crawling through the open passenger window, my air conditioner spilling cold air on my knees, Sunset Rubdown whispering while I lean over to talk to Kim who knocked on my passenger window, and we’re talking about how much she thinks the lyrics on ‘High Violet’ suck. Nothing I did or said made this happen, but the memory still lingers. The memory lingers and my arms wish I had hugged Kim that afternoon before I went to work.

One of the things we talked about last Wednesday was how much music we associate with Kim and how much music we can’t listen to anymore. Something about the chain of events and the happenstance of casual conversation made me wonder. I wondered if I could face another listen. Call me masochistic, but I needed to face this thing head on. Pull ‘Boxer’ from the shelf. Give it another listen. Wait until track eight and see how it makes you feel. The strange thing is that track eight was always the place where I would glance irritably at the back cover and think to myself, ‘There are still four more freaking songs to go on this thing.’ This time around here comes “Start a War,” here come the goosebumps, and I’m with her. I’m listening to ‘Boxer’ and I see it. Maybe in some way I see Kim through it. Maybe that’s overly poetic drivel. But I’m listening to ‘Boxer’ again right now. It was not my symbolic chosen music while I wrote this. Rather it is simply the third disc in tonight’s rotation. I understand that I am probably including ‘Boxer’ in current CD rotations as a tribute to Kim, but so what? ‘Boxer’ is on my iTunes again well over a year after I removed it. I will listen to it in album shuffle. I will hear “Start a War” and I will not skip it in irritation. I will wish for something better than before. I will wish for something more, and I will remember a chance encounter with Kim on a Saturday afternoon. After all the grieving and knowing there’s still more to come, the only thing I wish for right now is a chance to tell Kim how much she made me love the National last week. Somehow, though, something tells me Kim already knows this. That makes me happy.

Kimberly Swartz

As we all learned in elementary school a story’s setting is the place and time in which the events transpire. This year’s Academy Award Winner for Best Picture ‘The Hurt Locker’ clearly defines its setting as Iraq sometime in 2004. Early in the movie one of the characters is playing video games in base camp. To the properly trained eye, the video game he plays is Gears of War, a title that is exclusive to the Xbox 360. The Xbox 360 did not release domestically until November of 2005, internationally until December of 2005. Chalk this up as the only minor technical flaw in ‘The Hurt Locker,’ an otherwise excellent choice for Best Picture of 2010.

Call me Comic Book Guy if you want. I deserve it. I shall iron my hands later to chastise myself, but I can’t help it. I have to say these things. But dwelling on my snootiness is not the reason I am writing tonight about ‘The Hurt Locker.’ Tonight I am writing about ‘The Hurt Locker’ because of a tendency I have observed in war movies. I am a military buff. Growing up I was obsessed with World War II stuff, and I can bore anyone at any time if the conversation lends itself to cars, power steering, and the fact that Germany invented power steering in World War II in order to mount an anti-aircraft canon on a tank. I know. It’s sad that I know these things. Being obsessed with military stuff doesn’t mean I am hawkish when it comes to war, going to war, supporting war. Call it a morbid fascination with what human beings are willing to do to each other and the lengths they travel to do it. War disgusts me, but I have the urge to learn more about it. I want to understand war. The best way to do so is to put myself in the middle of it. Short of joining the Army, the only way to understand war is to educate myself.

Books, documentary, feature film, snippets of interviews with veterans online – if I think it helps me have a better perspective of why people fight, I will watch it or read it. Looking at my DVD collection there isn’t a shelf without a war movie. ‘A Bridge Too Far,’ ‘Glory,’ ‘Platoon,’ ‘Waltz With Bashir,’ and I can’t say anything bad about ‘Band of Brothers.’ Over time I have come to identify what’s good, to sort the quality work from the crap. You learn universal truths after a while. ‘Platoon’ makes ‘Hamburger Hill’ look like an episode of Mr. Rogers’s Neighborhood, and ‘Jarhead’ was a complete waste of time in comparison to ‘Three Kings.’ Realism is what I look for. Of course being an outsider means I have every right to discern between what is realistic and what is not, but the more you observe, the more you listen to testimonials, the more you read on the subject, you get a feeling for what’s genuine and what’s a guess. Both sides of the debate walk this line, both the patriotic garbage and the sentimental tear-jerking protests. Realism is what draws me to either side at any given moment. As with music or any other art form, any other storytelling, you can tell when something is honest. You just get that feeling. It’s hard to define, but realism is what keeps me watching.

After watching so many war movies, having my opinions about war, and then venturing forth into real life to talk to real people and see what they think, I have come to the conclusion that real people are idiots. I believe this to be true because real people use movies like ‘Platoon’ and ‘Full Metal Jacket’ to get their dicks hard, join the military, and then go off to kill others and themselves in places nobody cares about. After watching ‘Platoon’ and seeing Charlie Sheen turn into something just as monstrous as Sergeant Barnes you should feel absolutely no desire to have taken part in the Vietnam War. Don’t condemn the people who did take part, because that’s just as bad if not worse, but you should have no urge to experience insanity firsthand. Especially after watching this.

I speak from prior knowledge. I watch a lot of war movies, but back when I had cable I used to watch the Military Channel far more than I should have. I stopped watching it when they ran the same episodes of Future Weapons and Top Ten Such-and-Such-Who-Cares over and over again. Every Friday night was movie night, though, and they would show a war movie. The commercial they aired was ridiculous. ‘Platoon’ was one of the centerpieces as a voiceover invited us to “feel the rush of battle” and to “witness the birth of heroes.” When the voiceover invited us to feel the rush of battle they flashed a brief instant of a scene from ‘Platoon’ where an American soldier gets a healthy dosage of artillery fire (artillery that was fired by his own guns, no less, and they cut out the part where searing hot shrapnel burns the screaming kid). When the voiceover invited us to witness the birth of heroes we saw Charlie Sheen at the end of the movie, burned by his own napalm, holding a discarded AK47 and ready to frag Sergeant Barnes (again, they cut out the actual fragging). I really wonder if people think before they piece these things together and draw their conclusions, and then I remind myself that wondering isn’t necessary. The answer is no. Nobody thinks about the reality. Or they do, but the machismo thrill of an erection is too much to keep them from making a rational decision. The fact that anyone could watch ‘Platoon’ and long to be trapped in a killing mess proves to me that average citizens should not be allowed to vote. “It’s a lovely fucking war.” It sure is, and democratically elected officials brought it to us.

So what does all of this have to do with ‘The Hurt Locker?’ As I said before, ‘The Hurt Locker’ is an excellent movie that deserved its Best Picture award. Dealing with an Explosive Ordinance Disposal (EOD) team is the proper perspective for a war that seems to revolve daily around press releases of Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) and suicide bombings. What’s happening in Iraq is a multilayered mess that has me angry on levels deep inside that I didn’t even know existed before 2003. Two lines in ‘The Hurt Locker’ stand out and show me why I’m so angry.

In one scene a tanker truck has exploded in the Green Zone and the EOD team is sent to investigate. While examining the devastation they realize it was not the work of a suicide bomber, that instead it was a remote detonation from the hand of someone watching a safe distance away. One of the characters says, “You know there are guys watching us right now. They are laughing at this, and I am not okay with that.” That’s a perfect summation of every Devil’s advocate fiber in my body. Every time this EOD team is sent into action there are people watching from the sidelines, watching from rooftops, watching from balconies and minarets, people we know are probably responsible for what just happened or what is about to happen but there’s no concrete proof. If I was there I’d want to get them, too. We know these bastards are out there. Let’s just get them because deep down inside that’s what we all want to do. We’re tired of this garbage and killing every last one of them is the easiest way out. There’s nothing right or noble about it. It just is.

In the other scene, after a rather disastrous mission, the team is driving back to base in their Humvee. One of them thinks about the arbitrariness and futility of this war. “Another two inches. Shrapnel zings by, slices my throat. I bleed out like a pig in the sand. Nobody will give a shit. My parents will care, but they don’t count. Who else?” And this is where I do the rest of my finger-pointing, at myself and every last American who draws breath in normal every day life. How many of us have lived lives, meaningful or otherwise, in the seven years since we invaded Iraq? In the nearly nine years since we invaded Afghanistan? Unless we are directly connected to someone deployed to one of these wars, no one bats an eye when word comes of another IED blowing up a Humvee. We don’t think about it because we don’t care. We don’t care because the general thinking of everyone on either side of the war movement is “it’s not my fight, so it’s not my problem.” Our involvement with this conflict extends to either hoisting an effigy of George W. Bush as Hitler or waving a miniature American flag at a Sarah Palin rally. Beyond that we have no commitment or desire to be more committed, because then it might become our problem. Ignoring the issue is much more attractive. 4397 American soldiers have died in Iraq and over 30,000 wounded, so it’s definitely someone’s problem. Nothing is going to change it, so there is nothing else to say.

‘The Hurt Locker’ is a great movie because it has me digging deep inside myself to find these opinions, however ugly, unseemly, and unattractive they may be. ‘The Hurt Locker’ succeeds, and ‘The Hurt Locker’ is one of those timely cultural movies that everyone needs to see. Sit through two hours and wonder how hard it is to care for a moment.

As successful a war movie ‘The Hurt Locker’ is, I still see it falling into the trap that so many other war movies fall into, intentionally or otherwise. Remember my rant a few paragraphs ago about misguided patriotism? I don’t believe it was director Kathryn Bigelow’s intention to turn the end of ‘The Hurt Locker’ into a recruiting poster. At the end of the movie our main character is returning voluntarily to Iraq for another tour. When he joins his new unit we have Ministry playing on the soundtrack, and the credits roll to the tune of “Khyber Pass.”

Knowing what kind of band Ministry is, I know what Kathryn Bigelow was going for here at the end of ‘The Hurt Locker.’ The end of this movie is tragic. If the tragedy has not yet happened, then it probably will happen on this 365-day combat tour or the next one. This is not meant to be a stirring scene where our hero marches off to war for glory and fame. Rather, this is the sad state of affairs for combat veterans. Experiencing combat is like going to prison. After a while you adjust to a life of combat the way a prisoner adjusts to life on the inside. If you survive the combat life, readjusting to the normal world can be difficult, sometimes impossible, just like it is for many prisoners who are released after a decade of incarceration. Oftentimes, soldiers who return home wind up signing up for second tours, third tours, fourth tours, not necessarily out of duty or patriotism but because after a certain point the combat life is the only life that makes sense. It’s like an ex-con committing another crime just to return to prison. Ministry is here at the end of ‘The Hurt Locker’ because they bring out this tragedy. This music reflects the pain felt by many Iraq and Afghanistan veterans and the twisted normality that is the combat life.

I say these things knowing full well the style of music Ministry plays. I know my opinion of the average American when it comes to war movies, and I remember clearly the accounts I read in 2003 of American tank crews listening to Slayer and Rage Against the Machine as they drove their vehicles into Baghdad. I know what kind of music Ministry, Slayer, and Rage Against the Machine play. I know how politically charged it is and how anti-war it is. I know it. You know it. But this is the average American we are talking about. Average Americans are the ones who do our fighting, and average Americans are going to watch ‘The Hurt Locker.’ All I can think of are the misinterpretations. People are going to watch the end of this movie with our hero walking into another bomb zone while Ministry growls away, and they’re going to think how wonderful it is. Ministry gets you amped. Rage Against the Machine, yo. Let’s go pop some skulls to “Killing in the Name Of.”

Average people will watch this scene soundtracked by Ministry and think about the rush of battle and the birth of heroes. The problems highlighted by ‘The Hurt Locker’ and so many other war movies will be glossed over by ignorance. If you sit through two hours of ‘The Hurt Locker’ and think this is the best idea anybody ever had, just like if you sit through two hours of ‘Platoon’ and feel the urge to invade a village and randomly murder the inhabitants, there is something very wrong with you. Like I keep saying, I speak from prior observation. I have seen too many people react this way to war movies. We witness the adverse effect of what is intended. How is this possible? I haven’t a fucking clue. But the sad fact of the matter is that these people vote, and their vote counts just as much as mine or yours, and this is what brings us back to killing messes time and time again.

After watching ‘The Hurt Locker’ I wish that my only argument could be a simple matter of setting, of continuity, of a character playing a video game system that had not yet been released in 2004. Instead I am troubled by something more dire. Maybe it’s just the last bit of complexity in an already tangled web of clusterfuck. I’ll keep watching war movies if people keep making them. Sadly, though, so will everybody else.

Three years ago the National released an album called ‘Boxer.’ Many people hailed ‘Boxer’ as 2007’s album of the year. I was not included in this group of people. For a long time, long after 2007 ended and the shit-storm that was 2008 began for me, I straddled the fence regarding the National and ‘Boxer.’

At one moment I could see what everyone was talking about – a weighty album, a meaty album with nooks and crannies full of juices and flavors, an album anchored by the strong track “Mistaken For Strangers.” Then the next moment would come and I was on the other side, the negative side, seeing through ‘Boxer’ and agreeing that “Mistaken For Strangers” was indeed the strongest track, except that it fell in the number 2 slot and the rest of the album disintegrated afterward.

I oscillated back and forth like this for a long time, even as late as last year, and then I finally gave up. Let me defend myself for a second. I cringe to call it giving up, because I firmly hold this opinion. ‘Boxer’ may have been the single most overrated album of the Twenty-first century’s first decade, and the National may have been the single most overrated band. I gave up trying to like ‘Boxer’ because it wasn’t going to happen, and I wasn’t going to kid myself. I formed my opinion, and yes it is a negative opinion, but no one can say I didn’t give ‘Boxer’ a chance. I’m fair, but I’m also honest.

In 2010 the National are back with ‘High Violet.’ After only a few listens I am experiencing the same oscillation between love and pulling-out-my-hair that I did with ‘Boxer.’ For the most part, though, this time as I sit on the fence I have both of my legs on the positive side. The best thing I can say about ‘High Violet’ is that this one is everything I wish ‘Boxer’ had been.

The worst thing I can say about ‘High Violet’ is that it doesn’t kick in until the later tracks, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing. What dragged down ‘Boxer’ for me was having such a strong track like “Mistaken For Strangers” so early in the placement. After the high I was stuck with a sustained low – an intense low, yes, but still a low. ‘Boxer’ never recovered. With ‘High Violet’ the National sustain the emotional drive they are so excellent at igniting like a slow motion Roman candle.

My first focal point isn’t until track 6, “Bloodbuzz Ohio,” when Mike Berninger sings, “I was carried to Ohio in a swarm of bees.” On my first listen of ‘High Violet’ I was rewriting a longer work, and that line alone grabbed me. I knew I had to listen to ‘High Violet’ two more times, three more times, however many times it takes not to love ‘High Violet’ but to at least understand it. “It’s taking forever,” Berninger says on “Runaway,” and I want it to. Maybe I will never understand it, but that isn’t the point. The point is to listen. The point is to try. Most of all, the point is to be lost. I want to be lost in the tangled honesty of ‘High Violet.’ Here at the end, five hundred words later, I leap from the fence to spend the rest of the year with the National.

When discussing love songs you have to categorize every love song ever written. What is a particular love song about? Is the love that inspired the song an innocent love or a passionate love? Is the song about a feeling of love experienced for someone, or is the song about the act of loving/making love? When is a love song no longer just a love song but a work of art that transcends simple answers? When do the simple answers of a love song speak the greatest truth of all?

The most famous love songs tend to be about someone particular, either written for a real person or inspired by a real person. Near the top of most lists would be “Donna,” by Ritchie Valens, written for his real-life girlfriend Donna Ludwig. “Layla” also ranks near the top, a song that Eric Clapton wrote for Pattie Boyd in 1970. Boyd was married at the time to Clapton’s good friend George Harrison, but a love triangle was alive and well and blatant. Harrison and Boyd divorced a few years after the release of “Layla,” and when Clapton finally married Boyd in 1977 George Harrison attended the wedding reception with Ringo Starr and Paul McCartney. Try to wrap your mind around that bit of Dickensian romanticism. Makes for one hell of a song, though.

One of my favorite love songs written about a real-life significant other has to be “Tiny Dancer,” by Elton John, although he only gets a music and performance credit. Bernie Taupin wrote the lyrics, and he wrote them about his wife, Maxine Feibelman, who was indeed a dancer. The bus scene in ‘Almost Famous’ might have something to do with why I love “Tiny Dancer,” but I sang this song long before I saw that movie. I think about touring musicians, girlfriends and spouses traveling along wherever they go, and I think of the line, “Looking on she sings the songs/The words she knows, the tune she hums.” I’ve always imagined Bernie Taupin standing in the wings watching Maxine as she watches the show, madly in love with his wife and telling her how amazing she is the only way he knows how.

Perhaps love songs that are written for actual people wind up being the most famous because they’re grounded in reality. We tune to the real emotions of a moment, a year, a lifetime, whatever it takes for someone to boil over and create a remarkable piece of music. Whether or not we admit it and whether or not the notion truly is sentimental drivel, love is what keeps the human race going. Couples loving each other, love as the safety net of friendship, the act of forgiveness as the boldest statement of love someone can make – love is how humanity never ceases to surprise me year after year. We attach to love and listen to love songs because each and every one of us relates to love, the search for love, the need for love like our bodies need water. Love shows us the way whether we like it or not. The world would collapse without love.

An underrated and overlooked category of love song is the song written by a parent for his or her children. While storming over this piece I wracked my brains to come up with examples, and the best I could do are Will Smith’s “Just the Two of Us” and Loudon Wainwright’s “Rufus Is a Tit Man.”

Overlooked and highly underrated, because I think we fail to fully realize and appreciate the love of our parents until we are parents ourselves, or until something tragic happens. This type of love song is the best love song. This type of love is where we begin. With our first breath we know this love, and with each successive breath this love grows stronger. This type of love is the most important.

I talk about Sleater-Kinney a lot, and hopefully this will be the last time for a while, but when I think of every category of love, every instance of a real person inspiring a truly great song, I think of Sleater-Kinney. I think of Corin Tucker and all the hardships her family faced with the nine-week premature arrival of her son Marshall. I think of his strength, his survival, and I think of her love boiling over into a hell of a moving song called “Lions and Tigers” that didn’t make the final cut to the album ‘One Beat.’

I think of every love song ever written, every song about passion and every song about innocence, every song about real people and every song about fictional people, and I think about how much I adore “Lions and Tigers,” not just as a favorite love song but possibly as my favorite song, period. This song is the exclamation point on life. Love conquers all, and it starts at the beginning. Tonight I am thinking about “Lions and Tigers” because tonight is the beginning of a new life, a new statement ready for an exclamation point. I will let “Lions and Tigers” say everything there is to say, except that I love you Audrey Victoria Leitzke, born April 28, 2010.

Thank you Tim and Emily for making love possible.

Everyone was black, except me.  At one point an Asian couple walked in for about 5 minutes then left.  I on the other hand felt somewhat privileged to be there.  I saw it as an opportunity to see the inside underground world of hip hop.  I was introduced to many different musicians.  The bill composed of artists from DC and NYC.

Everybody seemed to know each other and there was a lot of support from the crowd.  I can’t really tell you who were the talents that performed.  Then again I can’t really tell who was part of the crowd or a posse or featured talent.  The microphone was being handed off every minute to a new person rapping.  The entire floor was the stage and there were no limits.  Rappers would walk around with the wireless mic and jump bar counter tops and going in and out of the crowd.  It was very intimate.  Everybody was dancing or putting their hands in the air and cheering.

I thought that photography wise, this was an extremely hard event to cover.  There wasn’t much lighting, everyone is black and I’m not using a flash, and because there was barely any light I had a very hard time focusing.  But what I got was very dramatic lighting, dynamic blurring motion and intensity expressed by the artists performing with all their passion.

A Thousand Blooms was held at Bloombars in Columbia Heights, a small venue that is focused on art and culture.  It may easily be missed as you’re walking down the street, yet once you step in it’s difficult not to feel at home.  The art exhibit received a great turnout as it attracted not only spectators who received an invite in advance, but also random people passing by.

The film screening, which was directed by Richard, was a short film about mixed couples and the prejudice the family goes through.  It was about 30 minutes and received strong support.  Overall, it was an event that received a great response.

X is a local showcase that displays the rising artist talents in a wide spectrum of fields.  I’ve become a regular at the X events and particularly enjoy the fact that all the art displayed is created live.  It makes you feel like you’re a part of something growing and productive on a Friday night, while slowly becoming intoxicated (literally and figuratively).  This month 88 teamed up with Amnesty International and held it over in a tight little spot in Silver Spring, MD called Ceviche.  It was a little bit out of the way, and when I arrived I found myself in a restaurant before being told I needed to be upstairs.  However, the turnout was good and the vibe was just right.

First and foremost, for the band and for those of us who may have heard the wrong thing, I believe the gentleman in the crowd shouted, “We were better last time,” not, “You were better last time.” I will touch on this later, but I wanted to clarify that.

Quasi came to Washington, DC, on April 24 to play the Black Cat, and I am going to miss hearing at the frequency my ears are slowly ringing away twenty hours later. For my first show outside of Roanoke in nearly three years I remember all the things I love about making the three-plus hour trip and all the things I hate. The love far outweighs the hate, which is why I keep coming back and throwing away gas money like confetti. I’m making it rain for Chevron. As long as it’s all in the name of supporting great music I’ll sell out Mother Earth.

I don’t feel like counting how many times I’ve made this trip. To see Stars alone I’ve driven to Washington, DC, four times. When you live as far away from DC as I do you have to choose the shows you really want to see. This means letting some of them get away. This also means picking the really important bands – the shows that give hauling ass more credence. The journey turns into a religious pilgrimage, a trek you have to complete in order to sleep at night knowing the music gods are pleased.

When I saw Sleater-Kinney on their last tour nearly three years ago I had to make the trip twice in four days because the first attempt at the 9:30 Club got cancelled. I drove home to Roanoke the next day feeling like I’d lost the Super Bowl. That was my last chance to see a band like Sleater-Kinney, and a massive triple-digit heat wave had to go and strain the 9:30 Club’s transformer to the point of explosion.

However, when I came home and checked my voice mail and found the show had been rescheduled two days later, I started doing cartwheels on my front lawn. It meant driving to DC and back in one night and going to work the next morning at 10:00, but there was no way I’d let this one escape. Living so far away from ground zero puts a story behind every trip. You remember each one as though they are individually branded. It doesn’t make the experience more memorable or more extraordinary. You just return home feeling like you’ve broken out of your boon dock shell. It’s like leveling up in experience points.

But what about the show? Quasi did play a solid set last night, and that’s why I’m writing this. Let’s talk about that.

Seeing Quasi was like seeing old friends. When you’ve seen a band multiple times, each time they take the stage is like saying hello to the old crew. This was my first time seeing Quasi, though. Obviously I’ve seen Janet Weiss perform before with Sleater-Kinney, but I had never seen Quasi. What made this so personable was the accessibility of Janet and Sam Coomes. Maybe I’m not very observant, but I’ve never seen a headlining act manning the merchandise table as the venue doors open.

I made it to the Black Cat a little after 9:00, scanned the sparsely populated floor when I went upstairs, and was surprised to see both Janet and Sam standing behind the merchandise table. Who wouldn’t go say hello? I bought my shirt from Sam, and while I was fumbling with my bag and the thousand things I had in hand I set my wallet on the table. What does Sam do plop an identical wallet on the table next to mine. Here I am before the Quasi show and I’m comparing wallets with Sam Coomes. Of all the “what the hell” moments in my life this was probably the best. Only a hipster like me would be this giddy, although the “what the hell” factor didn’t sink in until well after the fact. At the time, mid-conversation with both Sam and Janet, it just felt natural.

I’ve been raised, trained, engrained on the sanctity of theatrical illusion. With every production I’ve ever been involved the rule is the actors/performers never set foot in the house after the doors open. The theory behind this is that it “breaks the illusion.” After last night, I can safely say that theatrical illusion is a crock. Every show I’ve ever been to here in Roanoke has been among friends. My friends are in the bands and we hang out before the show, during the show, after the show, inside the venue, outside the venue. Who cares? They’re here to play music. We’re here to hang out and watch them play music. We’re all real people living real life. There should be no illusion, just a great fucking time. I’m getting thumped off my ass tonight and I might as well tell the band I’m looking forward to it. A minor interaction – a brief conversation – was the best way to preface the night.

When Quasi finally played there were no reservations. They were here to thump me off my ass, and they succeeded. Maybe it was my proximity to the speaker but as I said before I am going to miss hearing at that frequency. But it’s a fair trade. Quasi do everything right. Sam Coomes is like Jerry Lee Lewis projected through a Picasso prism. His energy alone is enough, and it doesn’t hurt that he picks his SG with his fingers.

Janet Weiss is everything I want in a drummer. She’s fluid. She’s patient. She makes it all look so effortless, but she’s tearing the kit to shreds and hitting you with an artillery barrage. All the while she’s back there just having the time of her life. I think of three musicians who symbolize each aspect I look for in a drummer. Mitch Mitchell is the frenzy. Levon Helm is the concentration.

Charlie Watts is the sheer enjoyment of playing music. Janet Weiss is as if all three passed through a matter transporter and had a horrible accident, but the horror is to our benefit. Some amazing new being has been created by combining the superpowers of all three drummers. That new being is Janet Weiss, and there are too many great things to say about her. So I’ll stop with what I have. Add Joanna Bolme on bass laying the groundwork like John Entwhistle and you have Quasi, April 24, 2010 at the Black Cat. They were raw, they were confident, and they were absolutely in love with that stage. Quasi are not a reincarnation of the Who, but anyone who has watched the Happy Who Year DVD that came with the Kill Rock Stars preorder of American Gong knows that Quasi should have been at the Super Bowl this year playing Who covers. And they ended the show last night with “Pictures of Lily,” sounding like they were born to play it.

If anything at all was wrong with the night, I would call it the crowd. Seriously? Quasi is playing the Black Cat and it’s only seventy-five percent capacity? Nobody is dancing? What is wrong with you people? I don’t expect a circle pit but I want to bounce a little. Somewhere in the middle of the show someone shouted, “We were better last time,” a comment that the band misheard but which prompted an adequate and necessary response. Why would someone pay money to see a band they don’t like just to shout, “You were better last time?” But the comment was indeed, “We were better last time.” I did not see Quasi the last time they played Washington, DC, but being part of that crowd I have to agree. We could have been better. I wish we had been better. That crowd was like an embarrassingly tired sex partner when you’re ready to roll. Next time Quasi is in the area I’ll make the pilgrimage. I’ll be a one-man cheerleading squad, even if it means being “that guy.” They take the time to be so accessible, to play so energetically and play so well. The least I can do is show them ho much I love it. And I did love it. Quasi thumped me off my ass, and I want them to do it again.

The last time I looked at an up-to-date music chart out of sincere curiosity was in the late 90’s when I still subscribed to Rolling Stone. I was still in high school when I decided I had better things to listen to than the boy band b.s. handed down to us by MTV. The face of Twenty-first century pop remains very similar to Justin Timberlake’s and Christina Aguilera’s, so I see no need to examine another music chart when I still don’t care. However, I will study a music chart if it happens by accident, and if it leads me down a nice train of thought. Today I stumbled across a story about the latest UK singles chart http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/entertainment/8603208.stm.

It seems that Lady Gaga has been toppled from the Number-1 spot by Scouting For Girls. I’ve never heard of Scouting For Girls, so this led me to wonder what a band called Scouting For Girls might sound like. Here they are
with the official video for their chart-topping song “This Ain’t A Love Song.”

A phrase that comes in handy for me X-number of times a day is  “Are you kidding me?” I think that says it best. This is not a defense of Lady Gaga or having her back in a bar fight. As the video for her former chart-topper “Telephone” shows us, Lady Gaga could probably stand fast and swing her own pool cue if need be. I’m just surprised that over a decade has passed since I cared about what was topping the charts, and nothing has changed. Scouting For Girls bare more resemblance to Vanessa Carlton than they do to Justin Timberlake, but sentimental gruel will never cease to dominate the airwaves. I had some hope. I must admit. I saw a song titled “This Ain’t A Love Song” topping a singles chart and thought for a second that maybe, just maybe, it might be worthwhile. Perhaps I just saw a song called “This Ain’t A Love Song” and immediately had visions of Public Image Limited.

Oh, but these visions and hopes are so misguided and futile. I tell myself I don’t look down on others for the music they claim to love. For the most part I follow this rule. In this case I can’t. It would be crass and hypocritical of me to say that PIL has more substance and merit than something as ridiculous as Scouting For Girls, but it’s true. That Scouting For Girls track is just so harmless. Music doesn’t have to be loud or abrasive or even offensive for me to call it edgy. Even if my ears aren’t bleeding I’ll still like it. I just like my power raw. I want my music to grit its teeth with a fresh tattoo still bleeding on its arm.

Music needs to take an honest chance. A flavorless Scouting For Girls and Lady Gaga’s blurred cooch just aren’t going to give me that honesty. I can’t define that honesty because it’s different in every case. All I know is that sometime in high school I realized honesty had no place at the top of a singles chart. I don’t think I want my honesty to top the charts. Honesty is by definition unfettered. Whatever tops the charts has gone through any number of processors on the way. Give me danger any day, as long as it’s bipolar and has teeth. Give me music minus the safeguards of public decency. It’s a lot more interesting out on the fringes. I might come back with an endearing scar or two.