"Revolve" by The Melvins

By Neal Dusedau

The Melvins might be a band some people love, but I’m not one of them. “Revolve” was vaguely a hit in 1994 and I really liked it. But I actually bought the album before “Revolve” hit the radio. Was I in touch with the underground? Did I have feelers out to find out what the next hot thing was? No. The Melvins had been a moderately successful band for ten years when this album came out. But what made this album call to me was the power of Kurt Cobain.

I bought Come As You Are: The Story of Nirvana by Michael Azerrad a few months after Cobain’s death. I wanted to buy it sooner, but word on the street was a new chapter on Cobain’s death was being added. I read it cover to cover in one sitting. Not only was it filled with great quotes from Kurt, but it was also an easy way to find out about bands I might like. After all, If Kurt liked them, they had to be good, right?

I don’t think I’ve owned an album that I listened to less in my life. Every time I popped it in I would skip straight to “Revolve” and when the song ended, my time with the album ended. I never gave the rest of the album a chance and I don’t regret it for a second. Listening to it now I still really like it. The sound of 90’s angst always warms my soul. Has any word fallen off the planet more in the last ten years than “angst”? I blame 9/11 and George W. Bush. How can you have teen angst when you think "evil-doers" are out to get you?

Meanwhile, this album began a sad trend that would continue all the way through college. Buying an album without listening to it, but trusting that it would make me cooler if I owned it. In middle school, how a band sounded was secondary. I just needed it to sit on my shelf, ready for a friend to casually ask, “Oh and what’s this band?” so I could school them with said band’s relevance and influence, proving my coolness or what a douchebag I was (depending on your point of view).

It’s not all bad. There were other bands that Cobain led me to that I ended up liking. I think this same book mentioned Sonic Youth. So when I placed my order for eight CDs for the price of one through BMG music service (tell me you took advantage of this deal in the 90s. not to be confused with Columbia music house’s rip you off deal), I went for Sonic Youth’s Day Dream Nation. It was actually completely awesome! But for every hit there’re tons of misses.

The last time I bought something solely on reputation and hipness was in Early college. At that time “Post Rock” was the cool thing to be into. I tried. I really did. But it was boring as all hell. Sort of like jazz if solo’s were forbidden. No, that’s not right. Like instrumental lite-FM. A few bands of the genre are great. The Sea and Cake, some of Tortoise’s stuff, Trans Am… But the band that started it all, Slint, put me straight to sleep. And their album is continually named the best blah blah of the all time by all sorts of semi-respectable indie websites. I think after I blew 50 dollars on Post Rock albums I learned to at least give something half a listen without buying it. And that’s how this all ties together: just like those crappy Post Rock records, I didn’t listen to a second of The Melvins before I bought the album. I wonder if younger folk reading this can even understand the concept of paying money for music, much less buying music without getting to hear thirty seconds of the song first to see if you actually like it.

"Lust For Life" by Iggy Pop

By Chris

I remember the movie Trainspotting, because that's where I first heard "Lust for Life." I was 15 years old sitting in my suburban mall's movie theater. I was a socially awkward teen, full of angst and raging hormones. I felt alienated from my Abercrombie wearing peers with their love of Dave Matthews Band, classic rock, and gangsta rap. As Iggy pounded his way into my head with declarations of over indulgence and raw emotion, I knew this was what I'd been looking for. The funny thing about coming to that conclusion right then and there was that I saw the movie with my mom, younger sister, and younger brother. I had lied to my mom in order to get her to take me to it. I told her that it was an action movie, and starred Sylvester Stallone. Afterward, I felt bad for exposing my then 9 year old sister to graphic depictions of sex, drugs, and violence. But it was worth it.

What I associate with that song is me coming out of my shell. I remember my best friend and I getting into punk. "Lust for Life" got me started going to local shows at VFWs, and churches. Of course, there was hair dye, silk screening, mail order, and drinking. There was getting sent to the office for wearing shirts that were inappropriate for school. However, when I got out of high school, and went onto college in the city, my interest in punk faded. I ran out of what was driving me in that direction, and my dedication to punk was replaced by interest in other types of music.

Listening to "Lust for Life" twelve years later, I like the song, but it doesn't have the same punch. I remember "Lust for life" as my go to song for when things were tough and I was upset. It was a reminder not to take things too seriously. Yet as much as I loved that song and despite all the music critics who talk about how important punk is... I'm still a bit embarrassed by my punk phase. Mainly its because I wish I would've went through it faster. I'm kind of a slow learner in terms of what makes me happy. A bit stubborn, too. My senior year in high school, I remember a supervisor at a fast food restaurant I was working at giving me a backhanded compliment. We were having one of those "philosophical" conversations that's painful to recall. At some point in the conversation I declared that I was a punk. He told me he was surprised, because I seemed to have more going for me than that.

"Down" by 311

by Neal Dusedau

I have a confession to make. In 1995 I told my friends that my greatest wish was for grunge to finally die and let my incredibly novel idea for the next wave of music take over. You guessed it, I prayed for a day when rap and rock would mix together to create the ultimate form of music. To this day, I still blame myself for what my simple request did to the world.

But at the time it made sense-- I was in need of more bands like Rage Against the Machine. If I could do it over, I'd never pray for what happened to the late 90s music scene, but I swear, at the time I couldn't predict what was going to happen. And it all started with 311.

311 was the answer to my prayers. When "Down" first hit the radio in July of '96, I bought the album and then I bought their t-shirt to celebrate my wish come true. Could this just be the beginning of a trend? Were there more bands mixing power cords and rap? I needed to find them. Ah! Sublime! they scratched on their records. Not quiet rapping, but still pretty good, the forces of rap and rock were mixing.

I spent the summer after freshman year working at our town's local day camp. I walked the mile to camp every morning with my yellow Sony discman in my hand playing the 311 album. And while "All Mixed Up" and "Stay Home" were good, they didn't rock (and rap) me like "Down" did. I had never heard such cranked up crunching guitars. I think they gave me the energy to deal with obnoxious eleven-year-old campers refusing to participate in the sport, game, or craft of the day.

"Down" was the kind of song that ballplayers play when they're at bat. It rocks really hard without being divisive. It's poppy while being aggressive and the rap lyrics are offensive to exactly no one. So how do I feel about it now? I want to say it sucks, but that wouldn't be honest since I just listened to it 4 times in a row without smashing my face apart. I guess it's kind of a good song-- but the kind that's only good if you haven't listened to it since 1996.

During the summer of '96 I tired of 311 faster than my campers tired of track & field day (Run! Run! Run all of your energy out before lunch-- nope, they were way too smart to fall for that). Soon after 311 left my life, I realized my prayer had been answered and I was satisfied. The combination didn't exactly work, but it was a worthy experiment. Thanks for the help, God!

The story should end there. Everything was back to normal. Nope, I'm a Jew dealing with an old testament God. How dare I not relish the rap and the rock mixed together? Throw it away after a few months? Not on God's watch. The following summer Three Dollar Bill, Yall$ was released and my perfect dream became the state of music's worst nightmare. Limp Bizkit took over and led the way to a bunch of bands that I don't remember except to say they were much worse than 311 and made you change the radio station twenty seconds into any of their songs.

Makes me think that if I had prayed for world peace, all war would have ended, but then the overpopulation that would ensue would starve us all. Too extreme?

"Fly" by Sugar Ray

by Katie

History will be unkind to Sugar Ray. Their legacy will undoubtedly be of a SoCal punk band (if anyone even bothers to remember that they were once "punk" at all) that cashed in on their one radio-friendly song and continued a Phelps-like winning streak of mom-rock hits. Not to mention the fact that their adorrrrrable frontman parlayed his music career into the totally credible hard-hitting news program Extra and the gripping documentary, The Pussycat Dolls Present: The Search for the Next Pussycat Doll.

You may not remember, but "Fly", before it became a cheesy adult contemporary hit, was played on the much cooler alternative stations. It was one of those songs that transitioned from the alternative-rock radio stations to the Top 40 once it began to gain steam. And as soon as that juggernaut started, WATCHOUTBABY, cuz this shitrollercoaster ain't got no brakes.

I don't remember much about my 10th grade chemistry class other than the time my teacher brought in his acoustic guitar and played a song he had penned himself about the mole (the scientific unit of measure, not the creature or skin condition, as noted in the lyrics). But I do have one very happy memory of being in an especially great mood because all morning I had "Fly" stuck in my head. It was one of those few stuck-in-the-head moments that's the opposite of annoying - it's a song you really truly like, and every time it plays in your head, your brain tingles. The best way I can describe this is that it feels exactly like a second glass of white wine.

Over the summer of 1997, "Fly" became a huge hit and eventually became pretty annoying. By the time school started again in the fall, the captain of my soccer team had added it to the "SIKE-UP" mixtape she made for practices, at which point I knew the song was truly dead to me. This may have been my first taste of having the feeling that I had liked a band FIRST but it was ruined because now these unhip jocks were into them.

I would also just like to mention that this mixtape also included "Tubthumping" by Chumbawumba.

You know what, though? "Fly" is a fucking awesome song. Throw this on at a party, and people will go fucking nuts, I guarantee it. If you sing this at karaoke, you will have gained the admiration of men and women alike.

Addendum to this story: Sugar Ray put out a new album last week. Seriously. Epic wins bookended by epic Fails; hakuna matata, amigos.

"Sullivan Street" by The Counting Crows

by Jodi Hildebrand

Yesterday, while bumming around in our den/office/guest room/music room, my boyfriend picked a song from MY iTunes. As the nice acoustic strums started, I said out loud, “Ooh, I like this, what is it?” Seconds later, the whine of Adam Duritz kicked in, and a surprising shame washed over me.

In efforts to purge our house of unwanted crap, we’ve been getting rid of old CD’s, Books and DVD’s, and before purging, I’ve tossed a few old favorites on the computer, just to have in case. (In case of a 90’s party? Who knows?) One such CD was the Counting Crows live album “LIVE ACROSS A WIRE” including a set from the VH1 show The Ten Spot and one from MTV’s Unplugged ( Do they even DO Unplugged anymore?)

I will admit…I loved the Counting Crows. Folky Guitar Rock, “cool” look, and, what I’ve realized is KEY to any music I love, TOTAL SING-A-LONG-ABILITY. Tell me you can listen to one minute and NOT be screetching “Rouuuuuuunnnnnnnnnd Heeeeeeeeeeeeeeaaaaeeeere, we all look the same.” “Mr. Jones” will make you dance. “Long December” will make you cry. “Rain King”? Come on!

Sooo, as my man and I serenaded each other with “Sullivan Street”, amazed that we both knew all the words after all these years, I realized that, today, to me, Adam Duritz’s voice might be one of the most annoying in history. But to my 13-year old self, he was a poet. His voice filled with all the sorrow, angst and all around whininess that 13 year old girls have. He sounds like an insecure girl who was growing out her short hair-cut. He sounds like a busload of chlorinated swim team kids.

I went to a Counting Crows concert after the release of their second album with a couple of the above-mentioned chlorinated kids. (LIVE opened for them. I hope someone writes a post about LIVE someday.) We’d just gotten our licenses (In fact, I don’t think I even had mine yet) and drove OURSELVES to the show. Whoa. Duritz was so drunk (or whatever) he was falling all over the stage. Trying to stand on speakers, but unable to keep his balance. But it didn’t really matter. We didn’t need him anyway. We were annoying enough. An entire ampitheater of teenagers and moms, squealing his lyrics back to him (and now in retrospect, sounding better?). Dancing to Mr. Jones, nodding our heads dramatically to Long December. We didn’t even notice when he forgot the words, because we knew them well enough. This was really good sing-a-long music.

Yesterday, in my grown-up den/office/guest room/music room, it was still good sing-a-long music. It was a much more sarcastic, sing-a-long, but for a few minutes we took the way home that leads to Sullivan Street. (Oh, and then listened to the rest of the album too…)

JUVENILE – "BACK THAT ASS UP"

by Dan Cohen

The year was 1999 and Juvenile was on top of the world. Unfortunately, Dan Cohen was not. Juvenile was fresh out of the gates of fame with his newfound rap stardom, Dan was just another sexually confused cog in the 4,000 that attended Poway High School. Juvenile had ice, bitches, a 37-city tour and a hit single. Dan had an average SAT score that sent his parents into deep concern, no ice, no bitches and was more concerned about the impending Y2K scare than he cared to admit.

Dan spent his days just trying to blend in to some sort of relaxed Southern Californian code he never understood. He had been scared into said conformity by what years later he realized was an immature overreaction to a horrible middle school experience. He spent his nights studying, rowing (so that whole “blending in” thing wasn’t working out all that well), conquering every Nintendo64 game known to man and wondering when he’d actually score the kind of babe the Beach Boys sang about. Dan was raised by parents of the 60s. He had an affinity for classic rock and was allergic to modern music. If you wanted recent, it wouldn’t get any further than the 80’s. He didn’t really understand the current scene. Grunge music sounded way too angry. “ What’s so bad about growing up in Seattle?” Years prior at his bar mitzvah, a mini-mosh-pit was birthed by “Smells Like Teen Spirit” which ended with a friend fracturing his ankle. The rap & hip-hop phenomenon had more expletives than he cared for. And let’s be serious, boasting about groupies and lots of money were problems Dan wish he had. “Stop bragging, you lucky assholes.”

The first time Dan heard what would be Juvenile’s career-defining anthem “Back That Ass Up” was the Homecoming dance in the fall of 1999. He had taken a girl, whom he had a massive crush on, to the dance. Her saying yes was unexpected, even if she was a close friend. Little Deuce Coop, he don’t know what he’s got. And now, the night he had waited for… was lost to wondering if, how, when he should make a move that he was totally unprepared to make. The ten couple limo, the Hungry Hunter steak restaurant and subsequent dance were all going by way too fast. No thanks to Dan’s flagrant insecurities: the constant, internal back and forth. “We’re just friends. Right? RIGHT?!” The obsessive question found itself back into his head time and time again, but never followed by a affirmative answer. It was as if he wasn’t hearing the music, while everyone (hot date included) around him danced their hearts out. He wasn’t able to enjoy his go-to moves like the robot, the shopping cart, and of course, the I-don’t-know-how-to-moonwalk-but-I’m-going-to-try-anyway-and-when-I-fail-I’ll-turn-it-back-into-the-robot. And of course, his request for “Safety Dance” had gone unnoticed by the DJ. Dan simply wasn’t enjoying himself…

And then the synthesized intro for Juvenile came on. Dan, a lifelong fan of Depeche Mode, immediately became interested by such a choice introduction. “Cash Money Records?” And without warning, a wave of white kids with an ethnicity-crisis started shaking in all directions from lessons that could only have come from the TRL video countdown and, if their parents didn’t block the channel out like Dan’s did, BET. There was a sexual awakening in the Poway High School gym. Dan smiled, his date smiled back. And there it was. The robot. The shopping cart. The I-don’t-know-how-to-moonwalk-but-I’m-going-to-try-anyway-and-when-I-fail-I’ll-turn-it-back-into-the-robot. It was as if Juvenile was playing Dan’s N64 and Dan Cohen was the on-screen hero. Juvenile dropped some beats that unlocked a secret code of awesomeness that brought Dan’s character to the next level. For 3 and a half minutes, Dan felt like part of something. Something that couldn’t have been provided by any amount of pretending to blend in, no Billabong shirt or Rusty surfboard, no Etnies shoes or Varsity jacket, no alcohol (well, yes, maybe alcohol), no limo ride or high five could’ve brought the satisfaction that Juvenile preached (fact: he would later become a preacher). At this point in his life Dan had never smoked marijuana, but at that moment, he was high.

As the night grew on, he ultimately wouldn’t make a move (or enough of a movement to be interpreted as a move). Lord knows he thought about it. And after the dance and after party, he came home and played N64 against his little brother who stayed up well past his bedtime up to hear the details about what he thought was sure to be the loss of Dan’s virginity (“Did you at least make out with her?” “No dude. It wasn’t like that.” “Lame.” “You’re lame.” “You pussed out!” “Fuck you, I’m going to bed.” “I take it back. One more game.” “Okay fine.”) The sense of disappointment was there, but gently mixed with a sense of enjoyment. It was this ability to take away the good things of the evening, to back that ass up, that Dan had learned from Juvenile.

One year later, Dan would get one brief glimmer of first base contact with this crush at his little brother’s bar mitzvah. It probably didn’t happen to Juvenile, as metaphorical as that would’ve been. After the Nirvana incident of 1995, Dan’s parents took control of the set-list. And besides, a lot of the kids were only 13 and didn’t understand rap the way that a senior like Dan might. “Posers.” Whatever the case, the DJ did play “Safety Dance.”

"Place Your Hands" by Reef

By Nick Confalone

In his seven years down south, Jason Bigelow had learned a thing or two about girls, he told me, sitting in the hot tub at our new house, his newly acquired southern accent contaminating the water with y’alls, fixins, and all sorts of twangy incomprehensibilities. He’d left South Carolina and come back to Delaware to live with us for two weeks that summer before junior year, and he told me I didn’t have to worry about girls anymore. He’d teach me everything he knew.

Girls had been mastered, beaten, easily defeated. Girls were Contra after the Konami code.

For two weeks, the soundtrack to exploring my new neighborhood was Place Your Hands, by Reef. Whether or not we carried boomboxes on our shoulders while we plotted out the cul-de-sac didn’t matter; the song was always with us, an angel on our shoulders, urging us to place our hands on someone’s hope, to run our fingers through someone’s soul.

It was a brain virus that grabbed us and wouldn’t let go. For two weeks, we couldn’t hide from what’s inside. I might have even been humming the song when we met Amanda Hollins for the first time, my new neighbor, out for a run, a dream come true.

I smiled at her. She smiled back. Things, as far as I could tell, were going well.

But then Jason stepped in front of me—he’ll handle this, thank you very much. He puffed out his chest, gave her a smile, and fired a shot of southern charm straight into her beautiful face.

Years later, in a college linguistics class, I learned that the official dialect family is called Southern American English (SAE). Shared features include “short front vowel drawl,” a tendancy to glide vowels up from their original position on the palette, and a relaxation of the nuclei of upgliding diphthongs.

Standing in front of my house that day, he spoke for ten unbroken seconds and we didn’t understand a goddamn word he said. He repeated himself, this time with a sly wink, but the accent came out even thicker. She shook her head and glanced at me. Neither one of us had any idea what was going on.

I guess Reef was his backup plan, because he only floundered for a moment before saying, slowly and articulately, to a tune that only he and I could hear: “Oh place your hands… on my boner.”

For the rest of high school, two full years on that beautiful cul-de-sac, I never spoke to Amanda Hollins again.

Angst In My Pants

Sparks


Rachel Gandin's Post!!!!

Somewhere during the transition from my junior high crush on lesbian folk music and my committed, grown-up relationship with hyper-sexual R&B, I had a brief flirtation with early 1980’s Los Angeles New Wave.

Presumably, Songs From High School exists to convey a mutual feeling of, Oh, look how far we’ve all come! Some will boastfully reveal that they used to luuv 98 Degrees, secure in their extensive knowledge of bands that matter today. Unlike these people, the hippest music I ever liked was during my junior year of high school.

During the 1994-1995 school year I dumped (was dumped by?) the Real Volleyball Girls of Laguna Beach, and found my new, edgy friends in video production class. Products of the Orange County psychobilly scene, they had nose piercings, wore Doc Martins, and totally fucking despised the oppressively mellow surfer/stoner culture of Laguna Beach.

I really liked these kids, but had a hard time committing. Most of their parents were divorced, they lived in apartments (the horror!) and had the freedom to do whatever they wanted, whenever. I could not say the same of my own home life. How could I pierce up my whole face and then go to visit my grandparents? How could I study for honors chemistry with my nerdy friends if I’m all done up like Betty Page?

That year, I saw on TV the 1983 Nicholas Cage movie Valley Girl. While watching, I was reminded of how much I loved the song Melt With You by Modern English. I went out and bought the Valley Girl soundtrack, which came out in 1994, and listened to the album continuously for 6 months straight. That album changed my life. Despite the mediocrity of the movie, Valley Girl managed to produce a very solid soundtrack, made up of many Los Angeles New Wave bands. I fell in love with it because the music sounded angsty, but more playful than angry. I could relate because my teenage years were painted with shades of annoyance and cynicism rather than with rage.

Listening to early 1980’s New Wave in 1994 felt like the perfect non-committal middle ground for me. It was hip enough to express a hint of social resistance, while never having to make a real lifestyle commitment, like if I were into Rancid or The Misfits. It was significant enough of a departure from LBHS’s most beloved Sublime, but the fashion wasn’t so dramatic and the message never too aggressive.

For my final project in video production class, I made a music video for the song Angst in My Pants by L.A. band Sparks, my favorite track from the Valley Girl soundtrack. It featured this punk rock kid named Ian who had a mohawk and a nasal septum piercing. The entire video was composed of close-up shots of Ian keeping the beat with his Creepers, his multi-zippered pants, and his Ray-Ban sunglasses. I have no idea where this video is now, but I’m suddenly compelled to find it. It may well be the only proof of cool I’ll ever have to show for.

Joe Lies

by Amelia Morris

The summer before tenth grade, I was confused. I had just quit gymnastics yet retained the look of a slightly taller Kim Zmeskal circa 1992 and was starting a brand new school in the fall.

The only thing I had going for me was the one friend I’d made in my new town. That summer, needless to say, she was my best friend. She was also a total punk rocker.

At my previous school, I had fallen comfortably into a sort of alternateen identity. I listened to Liz Phair, Tori Amos, Smashing Pumpkins and dressed accordingly—tshirts from thrift shops and cargo pants. But as anyone who has attended high school knows, if I wanted to fit in with my new group, I would need to cloak my Zmeskal-ian body with a brand new identity or risk being completely alone forever.

I bought a pair of doc martens, cut my hair short, tore up and patched my jeans, bought a shit load of punk rock CDs, (and so sadly, no, I didn't start with The Clash or The Jam or even The Sex Pistols. I got me some freshly used Op Ivy, Swinging Utters, Anti-Flag, and Minor Threat) and I started going to shows. "Not a concert, Mom. A show! And… I hate you!"

For the most part, it worked. I had a new group of friends and no one called me a poseur, except for my then on-again-off-again crush and now husband, Matt, who was no longer punk, but New Wave and who called me out for the alternateen I really was.

The only problem was I couldn't stand the music I'd bought. I hated the shows, too, especially the mosh pits. All the songs were too fast and too loud, and why was everyone so angry? I was way too young to be jaded—I didn’t mind the system or the suburbs and, to be honest, my mom was a really nice person.

But then came “Joe Lies” and The Bouncing Souls, and slowly my head began to bob along. Was this considered punk, too? Because I liked this. I liked how the song sort of swelled and then fell into the bridge that made me wait to belt out the refrain. I liked the lyrics too with their simple, relatable message: No. More. Lies! (For some reason, it rang truer to my tiny ears than Anti-Flag’s, You gotta DIE gotta DIE gotta DIE for the government!)

No more lies indeed? By Christmas the following year, I'd found a new group of friends, dropped the old ones in the classic, awkward way that you stop being friends with people with whom you’d previously shared jagged half-heart necklaces, grown my hair out the best I could, purchased Pablo Honey and The Bends, and was generally back to my old self again. My old self with some Bouncing Souls coming out of my step-dad’s Subaru’s stereo, that is.

Sex, Drugs & Heavy Orchestration

by Rachelle Bergstein

You’ve just turned 14.

You and your mother are fighting non-stop because your grades aren’t good enough; you tried wearing lipstick to school; you refuse to stop eating pizza at 4 and ruining your dinner. She’s in school too, getting her PhD, and she’s been locked in her office night after night studying (putting you to shame, actually, because you only study insofar as you glance at your textbooks and hope your reliable memory and reasonable intellect will do the work for you). You can’t remember the last time you spent quality time together but then suddenly, a 3-part documentary comes on TV that bridges the gap, appealing to your curiosity about the past and nascent love of vintage clothing, and her sense of 60s and 70s nostalgia…

It was The Beatles’ Anthology. For 3 nights you two lay side-by-side in her bed, glued to the television. You’re boning up on your music history and she’s corroborating the stories, saying things like “Aunt Patty was at that concert” or “I had shoes just like that.” For 3 nights you, as a young bitchy teenager, and your single mother, overworked and probably scared out of her mind, have everything in common. It’s like the old days when you and she used to watch black and white movies together, her giving you these pop-culture clues to her past.

You weren’t the only ones to enjoy Anthology, and everyone bought the double album. After the series was over, things went back to normal, with you and your mother living alongside one another in confusing alienation, quickly forgetting those moments when you spoke the same language.

About a year later, you start smoking pot. You discover recreational drugs via your best friend, and one night, after a bowl, and some giggling, and a fair amount of snacks, you go up to her room and she puts on the instrumental version of Eleanor Rigby.

Her room always smells like candles and body spray. Her bed is covered in pillows. She’s hands-down one of the most interesting people you’ve ever met, with her exotic Arabian eyes and anti-authority streak (stemming from her own experience of parental distance, no doubt). She lies down on the bed and you both listen to the song in silence. She confesses that she’s been playing it over and over, and meanderingly, she tries to explain what’s so powerful about it:

“I don’t know,” she says, closing her eyes. “It’s like I’m having sex with God.”

Nevermind that neither one of you has had sex. Nevermind that logistically, this sounds nuts. This is by far the deepest thing you’ve ever heard anyone say and you close your eyes too, wondering if you’ll ever be that fascinating, if you’ll ever hear a song that brings you so close to godliness.

Sexually.

The instrumental version of Eleanor Rigby, off of 1995’s Anthology, is really beautiful. But sadly, it still doesn’t make me feel like I’m getting down with the big man up in heaven.

The Scratch

by Morgan Schechter

Sophomore Year of High School I turned Sixteen, scored my drivers license, and convinced Dad to lease me my first car. (In LA, everybody leases.) The car was a black VW Jetta, which, like most of my valuables in High School, I felt compelled to name: Priscilla, Queen of the Valley. (God damn I was awesome.) Priscilla was small, but her sound system pretty much rocked. My friends and I would hop in, roll down the windows, and blast our angry white chick music as we sped out of the Valley as fast as Priscilla's wheels would carry us.

It was the late '90s in L.A., and the Sunset Strip was having a renaissance of sorts - to me the only thing hipper than "thift" shopping on Melrose (or down in Venice) after school was hanging out on the corner of Larrabee and Sunset come nightfall on the spot River Pheonix died, feeling like I was part of something dark and cool. When Seven Year Bitch came to play at the Whiskey, I didn't get tickets. But I'd be damned if I wasn't going to stand the fuck outside and try to catch a few bars of the show.

The song was The Scratch...

I want it

Give it to me

I love it

Dont give it to her

Youve gotta give it to me

I want it

I saw it first

I want it worse

...and so on.

How this song qualified as a Riot Grrrl anthem in my tiny feminazi mind is a little foggy now, but whenever it played there we all were bouncing up and down in an estrogen fueled mosh pit, bowing down to Selene Vigil like the angsty goddess we knew she was. I was sure that men were the devil - even though I'd only kissed a couple and I certainly hadn't dated any - so bands like SYB, L7, and Babes in Toyland really appealed to me in my post-Hole era. Let's be honest...there was a LOT of Tori Amos thrown in there too.

Anyway - The Scratch held a particular place in my heart because it reminded me of this girl I hated who had dated every guy I'd ever had a crush on. Ariana Mendoza. We ran in the same circle, but we weren't friends. Ariana was slutty, and everyone talked about it behind her back, but that didn't stop me from wishing I was just like her. (Sorry Ariana, it's true.)

Mine was a Catholic High School where uniforms were mandatory, so finding a way to stand out and seem edgy was challenging to say the least. I personalized my blue pleated uniform skirt and white button down shirt by dressing it up with Fishnet Stockings/Doc Marten Mary Janes/leather chokers/lots of buttons with meaningful sayings displayed on my yellow Jansport backpack. (You know...because I was super unique.) But Ariana did it better. She was allowed to dye her hair black (she even managed to get away with having some bright red streaks underneath, while I got saturday detention when I showed up to school with a failed dye job that left my hair easter-egg pink.) She also wore fishnets and Doc Marten Mary Janes, but her fishnets had HOLES in them. My Mom threw away anything she found of mine that was ripped or torn. Secretly I always wondered why the boys liked her even though she wasn't that cute...David, Nick, Mike, Tim, Angel...time and time again - I wanted them, I saw them first...and she nailed them.

What I didn't realize at the time was that Ariana understood the difference between LOOKING like a man-hating Feminazi, and ACTING like one. Thanks, Seven Year Bitch.

Let's take Nick Eagle for example. Nick was so hot. He had chin length greasy brown hair parted down the middle, his fingernails were never clean, and he had this huge scar on his abdomen from when he got his appendix out on a family trip to Poland. Fucking hardcore. Oh, what I wouldn't have given to touch that nasty scar.

My virginity, that's what. Not because I didn't want to. (Oh, I wanted to.) I just didn't quite understand how to take it to the next level. While I was threatening to kick Nick in the nuts with my steel toe boots at the school carnival, Ariana was giving him a handjob on the Zipper. While I was trying to think of something cool and smart to say (but usually just talking about the time I had explosive diarrhea in the Dead Sea and the salt water burned my asshole) Ariana was telling him about the henna tattoo she got on her left boob...and letting him see it. I once spent a beer run with Nick thinking I was playing coy, nervously sidestepping his advances, only to walk in on him in the bathroom with Ariana later that same evening. ...So much for playing coy.

Eventually I would come to learn that spelling Womyn with a "Y" only attracts other women. I would come to realize that not whoring around with the likes of Nick Eagle is probably why I've managed to stay STD-free all these years while Ariana chokes down a lifetime supply of Valtrex, and looks like she's got a bad case of the meth face. But back in the days where I'd stand outside of The Whiskey A Go Go for an entire Seven Year Bitch show in the hopes of catching a glimpse of Selene and the girls, I'd have to learn the hard way that being a prick tease just makes people think you're a lesbian while the forward (albeit less attractive) girls score all the good tail.

Bad Scene, Everyone's Fault

Bad Scene, Everyone's Fault - ...

by Bobby Curnow

Truth be told, I came into the real fun of high school fairly late… I didn’t touch alcohol until Junior year, and didn’t smoke pot until Senior year. I was a certified ‘nice guy’ who felt worried about my friends ‘experimenting’ while feeling terribly left out at the same time. I blame my good relationship with my parents and comfortable 6.5 on the popularity scale for not getting on the partying bandwagon earlier. I was simply too well adjusted and too self-righteous to feel that I needed to partake in illegal activities in order to have fun.

Yet as we all know, peer pressure is the un-slayable hydra of youth and before long I got sick of my friends sneaking off to drink and smoke without me. I jumped on board and quickly realized what everyone else seemed to know… drinking and doing stupid things was incredibly fun. Seeing that everyone had a head start in the Getting Fucked Up race, I hustled to catch up. I went to all the parties I could. Suddenly a whole new world of delightful chaos opened up to me. And where there is high school and chaos, there is drama.

So much drama, and so much of it completely, utterly, pointless. The puking, the recriminations, the making out, the gossip, the passing out, the breaking stuff, the betrayal, the new friendships with the wrong person… all of it was new, and all of it felt dangerous and exciting.

All that was missing was fast paced music with lyrics that unambiguously mirrored exactly what I was going through. Jawbreaker’s “Dear You” would make a couple rounds as an important emotional backdrop to my everyday life… it’s got the perfect amount of “angry-at-nothing” lyrics while remaining self aware and clever enough to appeal an honor student who was convinced he understood exactly what Samuel Beckett was talking about.

I swallowed this music whole, killing more than one cassette tape as I blasted it as loud as I could in my dead grandma’s ’79 Volare. “Dear You” on a whole is an angry, bitter album, but it has moments of pure pop bliss. “Bad Scene, Everyone’s Fault” was the perfect burst of energy after the hyper-gloom of the Christopher Walken in Annie Hall sampling of “Jet Black”. The guitar volley opening and relentless head-boppin melody instantly got me jumping in my car seat as I waited at the drive through at Arby’s. I remember it as a fist pumping reward for sympathizing so thoroughly with Blake Schwarzenbach’s bleak lyrics in the previous songs. I could always turn off my mind when “Bad Scene…” came on and simply rock out. And no one can ever rock out as much as a 17 year old in his own car driving to a party.

Today “Bad Scene, Everyone’s Fault” holds a special place in my heart because it so thoroughly captures that time in my life. Stealing beers, hearing a friend whining about an ex-girlfriend, and embarrassingly knowing every drum fill to a Zeppelin song. “Bad Scene” covers all that ground with a wink and a smile as well perfectly conveying the baffling contradictions of high school heartbreak. It’s an ode to the pure stupid drama and chaos that is a high school party... otherwise known as your most precious memories that you can barely remember. The song is quick and over too soon, seemingly like my 15 months of drinking in high school. But it ends at exactly the proper moment- right when the cops show up.

Here in my Pontiac, I can pump my stereo too loud

Here In Your Bedroom - Goldfin...

By Neal Dusedau

"Here in Your Bedroom" was featured on a mixtape I made when I first got my drivers license the summer before my junior year. Thanks to Nick Hornby and a slew of internet imitators, I've now read all too much on the art of the mixtape. Unfortunately, back in high school I wasn't cool enough to have read High Fidelity and I didn't have those valuable innate mixtape instincts. Thus, "Here in Your Bedroom" was sandwiched between the New Jersey high school special, "Carry on My Wayward Son" and the worst song of all time, "More than Words" by Extreme (as in Extremely terrible).

During my drive to school I was happy to listen to these cheeseball staples in the privacy of my car (windows rolled firmly UP), but the last block before the parking lot was time to show how tough you were-- to show how much you kicked ass (a high school feeling to be sure), and "More Than Words" wasn't going to get it done. Time to rewind the tape and let Goldfinger do the talking: I would whip around that last curve and barrel into the parking lot fifteen miles above the speed limit, windows DOWN, blasting the so-cal pop ska/punk of Goldfinger. It made me feel so cool, which is hilarious. What did I think I was proving? And if anyone did hear the song, they weren't going to think, "wow, that guy is punk as fuck." No, they'd think, "wow, didn't that song stop being popular two year ago?" I wasn't playing the Dead Boys, The Clash or even the Sex Pistols. I was playing the 90s equivalent of surf rock.

In retrospect, my choice of tough-guy song makes absolutely no sense-- like everything else from high school. Two years earlier, in 9th grade, I made an overly conscious decision to reject grunge and become a punk rocker. I bought Black Flag and Fugazi records and got pulled into the older alterna-kids scene (Thanks Winnie!). Yet, here I was two years older and I was trying to be intimidating with a really catchy top-40 ska hit. Now I'm not saying Black Flag is particularly better than Goldfinger (Yes, yes I am), but at least if you blast "My War" out of your car window you're making a statement.
Why did I pick such a soft song to rest my testosterone against? I owned the real "angry teenager" records, but I guess I'm just a sappy emo kid at heart... Or maybe a "monsters of guitar rock" kid? I mean, "More than words," really? How did that song end up on the mix? Did I hate myself back then?

Listening to "Here in Your Bedroom" now is pretty confusing. I assumed I would just hate the song, but just like a ditty from their Cali brothers, Sublime, I can still bop my head to it. "Here in your bedroom I feel safe from the outside, I can tell that you're changing, but still I feel so high." It's this (low) level of introspection that makes the song perfect for sixteen-year-olds. At that age you either had a girl's bedroom that you could spend hours doing absolutely nothing in or you were desperate to be invited into one. And, like everything in high school, it might have felt like forever for a moment, but a day later she had moved on and you were stuck feeling like an asshole. Not terribly deep, but something I could relate to at the time. And if you didn't get the theme in the verse, the chorus really breaks it down for you, "When I wake up tomorrow will you still feel the same? When I wake up tomorrow will you have changed... Cuz I still feel the same! Cuz I still feel the same! I, I still feel the same!"

Um, I wonder if he still feels the same? I also wonder if the owner of said bedroom broke up with him because he was so nervous about her feelings changing?