Seen and Herd

He's the one

Who likes all our pretty songs

And he likes to sing along

And he likes to shoot his gun

But he knows not what it means.

- Nirvana

I’m not a trendy asshole

I do what I want

I do what I feel like.

- Offspring

Whenever I'm asked why I like what I like, I usually respond with a blank stare, a shrug, or just a dry “what's it to you”. It’s like asking a person why he likes blue over orange when the latter is obviously the best color in the spectrum, and then wondering why the hell the other person picked the other. What kind of answer are you looking for when you ask questions like these, anyway? It’s one thing to be genuinely interested about another person’s preferences, and entirely another to ask questions that are seemingly harmless at first glance but are pointed accusations that always come across as how could you? Or to be blunt: How could you like it when it’s not the popular choice?

Like in music: someone asks me what I enjoy listening to and I mention something even my parents were partial to (by that I mean they liked when they were young) and suddenly the person looks as if he was speaking to a leper or someone with a bizarre sense of humor. Add +100 damage if said person is younger than you. And then comes the all too-familiar “Luma na yan, a.”  ("That's old.") And I’m always tempted to get back with something like coercing the guy to join MENSA for that phenomenal observation. Of course I can always lie and give something very generic like the ones I see every time I tune in to some music video channel to save myself from ridicule but why bother? Oh, I see. It was a tasteless joke about my age. Stupid me. And by the way, pu+@&^@ mo rin. I’d take an idiot’s heckling anytime over being known for liking crap disguised as something else just because it’s “new”.

It is amusing. This general assumption that anything not commonly spotted in the radars of contemporary pop culture are automatically regarded as a waste of time or, at the very least, ugly, boring, or nonexistent. Of course this is true to some degree. Popular is popular no matter how defiant one is regarding that definition. And some---most, actually---of what I like has been popular during their time as well. So who am I to say that today’s collective taste is bad? But then I’ve always held on to the adage that popularity isn’t always in direct proportion to quality. Or perhaps my headstrong revulsion toward latching on to trends because it makes me feel like an idiot---because that’s how I perceive people with no identity of their own to fall back to. It’s a bit tricky, as well. All a person has to say is that the Beatles were the largest pop musicians in the planet; so does that mean I’ll snob them had I been born a little earlier and lived through the height of their popularity just because they wrote corny love songs designed for teenaged girls? Probably.

But then The Beatles innovated—they reinvented their sound, subject matter and even their very image to grow from singing about puppy loves to singing about Eastern philosophies, mind-altering substances and even looking through the eyes of a 64 year-old. And I am more familiar with their later works like Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band, The White Album, Revolver, etc. I have been exposed to their music since kindergarten (due to my father’s bootleg cassette copies) but my interest toward the band came when I was in high school. About the same time when puberty demands listening to subversive music by bands with the least surplus of sappy love songs in their catalogues. They went from being top 40 poster boys to serious artists.

Ah yes. Artists and art. As much as it makes me cringe at sounding like a pretentious poseur I'd have to admit that it is the main factor I look for as a spectator. It is very hard to define or peg because most of the time, shock value or nauseating attempts at cuteness are often received with more enthusiasm than the real thing. This is unnerving to put in one's journal. Especially when everyone nowadays seems to have a delusion that automatically gives license to proclaim themselves as artists just because what they do requires a level of creativity even a trained chimpanzee won’t have a problem attending to. But I digress and that’s a separate topic, altogether.

The point is how can it be unfashionable to like something like A Clockwork Orange or Kraftwerk or Led Zeppelin during these times when they have already proven their value to the world? The Police’s Reggatta De Blanc was released in 1979 and I have yet to listen to the entire album. You can argue that it sounds dated, but so what? Truly good songs are timeless. If what’s being played now sounds good because it’s new, then why bother liking it? It would be passe in a year, or maybe within months, anyway. Give it a few more years and someone with an IQ of over 15 would inevitably mumble “Luma na yan, a.” You’d be better off not liking anything, if that’s how your twisted logic operates.

And I am aware this is sounding more and more like the intergenerational grousing that typical old people like grandparents usually do. That people were more sensible in their time than today’s society with corrupted values and reckless youth, and so on until the cows come home about everything that’s right about theirs and everything that’s not in the present. To a person, pretty much everything about his generation is the best compared to the rest. And I am guilty of that to some extent, except that I also appreciate most of what they said that was great about their generation. And my parent’s generation. And mine, of course. I try hard to see any redeeming qualities on today's contemporary landscape and the only thing that struck me as totally original these last few years was William Hung.

Even guitar-based bands not only sound alike, but also talk of the same lovelorn woes or how they’re gonna slit their wrists because, well, they just feel like doing it; because they are overtly emotional. As if Weird Al Yankovic does not have emotions due to his irreverent humor and approach at creating/parodying songs. Or maybe I’m just not looking. Even films that are being peddled nowadays are just bloated, but ultimately hollow versions of their original 80s incarnations: The A-Team, Predator, Aliens, even the upcoming Tron Legacy and The Transformers.

If consumerism was already bad enough in 1979 to warrant a stinging criticism via George
Romero’s Dawn Of The Dead, it sure as hell no different now. If anything, it only got progressively worse. Music, film, literature and other branches of the creative arts are reduced to products with a definite shelf life designed for today’s generation with an attention span relatively comparable to that of a jellyfish.

I guess this is the inverse of a previous topic I posted a few years ago (Indie-Indiehan). In that I touched on one of the most extreme form of snobbishness in the guise of liking something, anything, not popular or known to at least five people because of a weird form intellectual arrogance; and here I’m ranting about an extreme form of intellectual inadequacy that is abysmally annoying because most people seem to be suffering from it. Hard to believe that herd mentality, coupled with the dependence toward Google and Wikipedia to do the thinking reduced most people into mindless cows content on eating what the media shoves down their throats.

FURTHER/RECOMMENDED READING: The Dumbest Generation, Mark Bauerlein

RIP NIN : Enter Trent Reznor

A few minutes that felt like hours after Pupil finished their set I had this sudden panic attack that perhaps Trent Reznor and Co. had bailed out of the entire proceedings without so much as a "fuck off" to their fans who waited for NIN to come to the Philippines with probably more enthusiasm than the second coming of the almighty himself. The thing about rock stars (Reznor wouild cringe at this description) is that their unpredictability is also what makes their music so compelling in the first place. I'm a big fan but i doubt if I'll be able to forgive him had he pulled that kind of stunt. I mean 1k isn't something I can pick anytime from a tree after all. Even the hairy bearded guy who sat in front of us (me, my wife, and my sister-in law) who gave the impressioin of a calm composed individual shattered all preconceived notions when he yelled "TAMA NA YANG ILAW!!! GO NAAAA!!!!" So much for first impressions. I just reminded myself how big a perfectionist Reznor is. From the countless interviews I've read about the guy, they never fail to highlight the man's obsession about meticulousness. That Reznor never fails to accomplish something once he puts his mind into it. One interview with a former employer when was still a handyman for a recording studio put it more simply: "When that guy waxed the floor, it looked great." So I just waited for the strobe lights to be tweaked a little more. Better safe than sorry.

Then the lights dimmed and the crowd gave a collective howl of anticipation; and just as the strobe lights behind the stage blared at full blast along with the first bars of "Somewhat Damaged", the dark lord of industrial marched toward the mic and grabbed it with both hands like he was gonna strangle it, and loomed toward the lucky audience members in front with the more expensive tickets. He may have aged, but the vitriol in his performance has all the menace and swagger of a rock behemoth that gives contemporary moron 'rock' stars half his age a run for their money as far as performing with brass balls and musical innovation is concerned.

We were seated in upper box b, so the view wasn't that spectacular. Good thing they were selling those handy cardboard binoculars for only P50 a piece so we got to see the band a little more clearly. Reznor's look nowadays is a far cry from the long-haired and lanky alternative-era doomsayer who popularized songs about self-destruction, unsavory sexual practices and suicide; even penning one of the most recognizable choruses in pop culture history courtesy of "Closer", off 1994's The Downward Spiral. That song, incidentally, may also be NIN's most popular as well. I assume it is, because when the opening beats for that song came on, the audience just went crazy. The man who performed last Wednesday was buffed and sporting a close cropped hair and looking every bit like a man in his mid-40s might look. If you didn't know the guy you'd probably assume he's the band manager instead of the singer. But when he screamed "Too fucked up to care anymore!!!", you'd agree that no manager in this planet can do that with as much conviction as he did.

What followed was a set that was simultaneously loud, brutal but soft, and even gentle and pristine in some parts. The stun-volume favorites were there: Gave Up, March Of The Pigs, Wish and Head Like A Hole. But in my opinion the most arresting bits were the less-than famous ambient/instrumental tracks taken off the little known 1999 release The Fragile. Notably the ocean-filled imagery of La Mer. That was certainly enough to give everyone pause, specially first-timers who probably thought thrashing and abrasive music are only things the band knew how to do. And the lighting that Mr Morose was complaining about earlier added to the atmosphere of every song (I think he came around it at the end; he was utterly stunned.). It had the same loud-soft dynamics that the band continously hammered the audience with. They even performed covers of David Bowie and Joy Division. With the latter also featured in the OST of The Crow way back in '94. They ended the set with 'Hurt'. A perfect epilogue to a historic tour that I'm sure won't happen again. In that regard all who watched it were very lucky.

NIN belongs to my generation, and I am proud because of it.

Happy Anti-Valentine's Day

There's something oddly comforting about The Cure's brooding and introspective masterpiece Disintegration (1989). Even though the entire album is a guided meditation that veers to a gradual descent toward loss, broken dreams/promises, declarations of unrequited love, and a bleak and distant yearning for happier times that could have been, the overall impact to the listener is anything but feelings of gloom. You do get a little misty-eyed from time to time but it's akin to watching a movie that deals with the same heart-wrenching subject matter than actually reliving what is being sung; leader and main songwriter Robert Smith is a good storyteller, after all.

Among its two counterparts, Pornography (1982) and Bloodflowers (2000), Disintegration is the middle act of an epic trilogy devoid of any upbeat melodies meant for top-40 radio. These are the kind of albums that are in heavy rotation as soundtracks to every suicide (along with Joy Division's Closer). Some concert reviewers even joked about giving complimentary ropes at every Cure concert in the past. Characterized by a grandiose wall of sounds created by synths, keyboards, chiming guitars and drum work that sounds like gunshots, and set to Smith's sharp wordplay and acute sense of crafting vivid imagery makes Disintegration, in my opinion, the definitive Cure album.

I have been searching for this album for so long. I scoured every known music peddler from the corporate-owned variety to the smallest flea pits where only hardcore collectors and audiophiles dare to tread (I did find other notable albums like The Stone Roses and NIN's Pretty Hate Machine during this quest), but only managed to acquire their singles collection Staring At The Sea. Even Quiapo - the ever reliable haven for hard-to-find music, movies and reading materials - didn't have it. While I am aware of the internet and wonders it can do to acquire digital files, when it comes to music I am old-fashioned. The album, the sleeves, the entire package and yes, even the search, is everything. I believe those are parts of the complete album listening experience. But sometimes you just have to listen to something so bad, you are compelled to bend some of your established rules to satisfy your curiousity.

As expected, the music was excellent. All the songs are epic in scope, each masterfully crafted by the band and clocking in at no less than five minutes. "Plainsong" opens with the most apt lyric that sets the tone for the entire album: "I think it's dark and it looks like rain...". Smith sings in a resigned manner that even the biggest yearnings actually feel the end of the world even if it were answered. But the genius of tunesmiths like Robert Smith is that they are able to channel all these moping and self-pity into pop masterpieces full of hook that helps in digesting an other wise heavy concept album all the more easier to the casual listener. This is definitely the album to play this Valentines. Full of anthemic shout outs tailor-made for the soundtrack of your own miserable existence.

DIDs

I just finished reading the Rolling Stone top 500 records of all time. It inspired me to write something in a similar fashion. So if you'll excuse me I'd like to submit 10 best (for me as of now at least) albums I'd take into a desert island should I be forced there in exile.

The Stone Roses

- one of the most innovative and revolutionary bands of all time. A very important and, above all, enjoyable record.

Dig Your Own Hole, The Chemical Brothers

- a rock record disguised as an electronica act. The infectious beats steer this brilliant recording from the boring realm most techno acts often get stuck in after two tracks. electronica at its finest.

Kind Of Blue, Miles Davis

- my first exposure to this album was from my father. I remember I was still in kindergarten when I first heard it and thought it was pretty lame compared to Michael Jackson. Listening to it again after several years made me rethink that comparison.

Siamese Dream, Smashing Pumpkins

- billy corgan is one of the greatest songwriters I know. This album, in my opinion, can give Nirvana’s NEVERMIND a run for the money as the album that defined the 90s and Gen X- a generation I’m proud to be part of.

The Downward Spiral, Nine Inch Nails

- a very dark, but pretty album. Trent Reznor’s ear for interesting beats make this a very catchy record perfect for those rainy days when you’d like to lock yourself up inside a dark room, strap in the headphone, and wallow in misery. A perfect concept album.

Violator, Depeche Mode

- one of the best groups to have come out the 80s and reinvent themselves successfully from a synthpop boyband to a rock-oriented experimental unit. Everytime I put this on I feel like a little kid again. Nostalgia is always good.

Appetite For Destruction, Guns N’ Roses

- the attitude and arrogance came through as genuine and scathing enough to make a permanent mark on the consciousness of music listeners everywhere. GNR’s finest hour.

Garbage

- aggressive, futuristic-sounding amalgam of electronica, grunge, and pop. I never tire of Shirley Manson cooing about “tearing my world apart”. One of the coolest albums there is.

Automatic, The Jesus And Mary Chain

- a lot of people claim “Psychocandy” was the masterpiece. Of course. I’m all for pop sounding and danceable melodies though. And this album has plenty of it. Sunny and melodic all throughout even if the subject being talked about is anything but.

Jar Of Flies, Alice In Chains

- dark and cold sounding EP that proves just how good this band actually is. too bad about Layne Staley, though. he has, in my opinion, the best singing voice in all the seattle bands and we'll never get to hear it again.