Hot Summer Car Jamz: Super Nostalgia Edition!

I think the beginning of summer makes me nostalgic; I totally had the urge to listen to Liz Phair today. I always get a little sad too, realizing that the days will get shorter for the next six months. Whip-Smart got thousands of plays in my car's tape deck, back in the day. Before the mp3 revolution, people had that connection to music; you'd buy something, and that would be it, you better like it, cause it's gonna be a week before you have disposable income again. You looked for reasons to like it. There were plenty of albums I didn't really dig, but I committed to giving them 3 or 4 listens, because dammit, I bought it! And you know what? Sometimes, you'd catch something on that third listen and the album would end up in permanent rotation. Nowadays, it's the opposite, you look for a reason to hit the skip button; to go ahead and find the next thing. It's hard, cause a lot of the music I love didn't instantly grab me. I really think that most people will like an album if A. they culturally identify with it, and B. they are familiar with it. These days, I need to actively decide to get into something and then see how it plays out. It works for me, but it's not the same.

One thing that kinda sucks about living in NYC is that you don't spend any time in people's cars. I know it sounds weird, but there's an intimacy factor; it's probably as close as you get to someone until you get into their bedroom, if you ever get that far. A lot of the music that really sticks with me, and would guess most of you too, has a strong person/place/time connection. In a car, you instantly had person/place association. Whenever I hear "Only in Dreams," I'm baked out of my mind in the back of Chet's police issued Crown Vic with four other kids, parked down by a lake where no one would bother us. Whenever I hear "Mayonnaise," I'm cruising around with Meg in the middle of the night, feeling lost and hopeless, but also feeling like we belonged; if not to the world as a whole, but at least to each other. Whenever I hear "Marquee Moon," I know it's exactly as long as it took me to drive from the giant Victorian house I split with six other people across from the JCA in Amherst, to Rachel's two bedroom apartment on Randolph Place in Northampton, provided it was late at night and there was no traffic on Route 9.

Farewell, Mr. Jeter

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The guitar guy played real good feedback... The top 5 Lee Ranaldo Sonic Youth songs.

  When I was a teenager I had the world subdivided into two sets of people, those who liked Sonic Youth, and those who did not. They were the most famous obscure band in the world. Obscure to the general population of course, not the arty-intellectual types like my friends. During a time when grunge and hip hop were breaking into the mainstream, most kids were exposed to at least some decent music, just by turning on the radio. If you were into Sonic Youth, it meant you dug a little bit deeper. SY fans weren't going to be jocks, call you a fag for having dyed hair, probably read books other than the ones required by school, and generally, were less likely to be total dicks.

  When Thurston and Kim split up, I gotta say, I didn't really care. Maybe I'm just jaded, old, cynical, but I'm an adult now, they are people, shit happens, whatever. I like the newer Sonic Youth albums, but I really haven't been deep into a SY release since A Thousand Leaves. It's not them, it's me. I don't think they ever put out a bad album maybe unless you count Cicconne Youth or whatever your least favorite SYR EP was, and that's really incredible. That's NINE albums that I love and another handful that are somewhere between good and very good.

Nothing will ever be as cool as this. Deal with it.

  I saw Lee Ranaldo play one of the last shows at Maxwell's (RIP). The timing of it all; the Kim and Thurston split, the SY breakup, and Lee releasing a strong album of very accessible rock songs, really put a spotlight (for me at least) on Ranaldo's work in SY. Part of me wanted to avoid gossiping or even realizing that the couple who defined the band that basically shaped my existence has broken up. Part of me was pumped from seeing a really good show, with a band member who had always been a supporting actor finally in the starring role. For the first time since hearing Washing Machine back in 1995, I really saw Sonic Youth with the indie-camelot folklore stripped away.

What the Boston Marathon means to New Englanders: an explaination for the rest of the world.

Growing up on Cape Cod, there are a few facts of life that seemed universal; alcohol came from a package store, pizza topped with linguicia was common, and spring came every year, sometime between Easter and Patriots' Day.  When I left home and befriended other students from across the country, I was surprised how unique these things were.  I know some of you are wondering what a "packie" is, and if linguicia is any good (it's incredible!), but unfortunately, if you've been following the news, you probably now know of Patriots' Day for all the wrong reasons.  However, I'm not sure you fully grasp the concept, what it means to a native New Englander, and why people like me (a transplant to NYC with no real ties to the Boston metro area, other than a love of Boston sports teams) are taking this tragedy particularly hard.

Public schools in Massachusetts are closed every 3rd Monday in April, to commemorate the battles of Lexington and Concord (which are generally considered to be the real start of the American Revolution).  As a kid, Easter and St. Patrick's Day fly right by, but Patriot's day marked the beginning of spring break.  There could be a blizzard on Easter or St. Pat's, (hell, I even remember an April Fools Day storm that dropped over a foot of snow on The Cape!) but by Patriots' Day, it would definitely be springtime.  Every kid new it.  We waited for it since the end of winter break and cherished it, knowing it would be our last breather till summer.

The Boston Marathon is run on Patriots' Day.  Every year, or at least as long as I can remember, Marathon Monday.  Amongst long distance runners, the marathon is a premier event, known for it's tough, hilly, windings, from Hopkinton to the center of Boston, "heart break hill", (the last big hill before the city) being the marathon world's fiercest adversary.  I didn't need to wikipedia this.  I just know this shit.  Not because I have an incredible memory, or follow long distance running, but because I grew up watching the race every year.  Every year.  Plopped down on my couch, listening to Chet and Natalie drone on about a marathon, possible the most boring spectator sport there could be.  But it was a big deal because it was our Rose Bowl, our Kentucky Derby, and our Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade, and our Vernal Equinox, all rolled into one.

The NYC marathon is important.  It's a big event.  But it's a big event in a city FULL of big events.  It's on the weekend, when most of my friends are nursing hangovers, or going to yoga, or nursing hangovers at yoga, and though I stumbled down one year to watch the runners make their way over a cigarette butt-lined stretch of Bedford Avenue, I can't say I'll be marking it on my calendar in the future.  Last year's was cancelled due to Superstorm Sandy (it's been a bad year for marathons in the Northeast, to say the least), and outside of a couple of grumblings, and the disappointment of those who had trained to run, the whole thing passed like any other bump in the road.  In Boston, it would have devastated us.  Not because Bostonians are weak, (though neither group might want to admit it, New Yorkers and Bostonians are way more alike then they are different), but because it's the only big thing we have.  Because it's the embodiment of our package stores, and rotaries, and white clam chowder (the way it was goddamn intended to be), and it's the f'ing hot dog buns sliced on the top, and it's...  it's us.

I understand that there will be, for lack of a better term, lunatics, who will from time to time do things like this.  I understand there will be misguided individuals who are brainwashed into thinking that acts of violence help their religion, or political struggle, or whatever.  The deeper reasons behind these violent acts, we may never fully understand.  I guess I just want to make sure that you understand what the Boston Marathon meant to a kid who grew up on The Cape, and was in love with springtime.