With apologies to my main man from high school, J. Mascis
was my first love. I was 13 and I didn’t
even know what he looked like, and I didn’t really care. (This was before the
internet was what it is now, no Google, no Yahoo, no way to find out every
intimate detail about somebody by simply typing in their name and hitting “enter.”
Kids these days are so spoiled.)
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| Had I seen this when I was 13, it would have enforced my love. (Ebet Roberts/Redferns) |
All I knew was that his voice, his lyrics, his freaking
amazing guitar playing was all for me. He was my soul mate. He’s the reason I
spent my early teenage years in a fog of manufactured sadness. I wanted to hug
him, to protect him from whatever made him so sad. It was all about the music.
My first musical crush was Chris Cornell, but with him I
think it was all about the hair and the piercing eyes. Let’s face it, that man
is a minor god, still. He’s aged very well. But he was no match for the pure
soul that J. Mascis poured out from the dented speakers on my portable CD
player. You know, the kind that had a CD player on top and a tape deck on the
front. Because, well, my Dinosaur Jr. albums were on tape. I was cheap and tapes were cheaper, so that’s what I bought.
I liked other bands, sure, but I was crazy for Dinosaur Jr.
I listened to them everyday, sometimes all of the albums back to back, over and
over. In the car with my parents, I begged them to let me listen to my tapes.
My dad even liked a few of their more radio-friendly songs, though he insisted
on calling them “Dance for Junior.” (He also called Pearl Jam “Toe Jam.” So
disgusting.) I had the names of all of the songs memorized in order from oldest
to newest and vice versa. What can I say, I had a lot of free time.
When I discovered that J. was in a movie called Gas, Food,
Lodging I recorded it (VCRs, ha!) on HBO and watched it over and over again. I
memorized his few lines and obsessed over them, and his delivery of them. I
still love that movie.
J. was Dinosaur Jr. for me. Yes, I knew he had a reputation
of being so difficult that there was a revolving door of artists that were in
the band with him. I even grew to love Lou Barlow and Sebadoh. But despite what
Lou screamed at J. during a Sebadoh show, J. was the band, not Lou or Murph. Lou and Murph did
not make J.
Now, almost 20 years later (can that really be true??),
Dinosaur Jr. has reunited and released several albums. J. released a solo album
that takes me right back to my teenage years. He still speaks to me. He gets
me. "Can I" is one of the best songs I've heard. And even though he has a wife to protect him from pain now, if she needs
backup, I’m available.
6 comments:
Man, we've been way over due on a music blog. Okay confession first. I've probably heard NO Dinosaur Jr. But at the time when I would have heard it, I was spending my formidable youth in the projects of North Carolina. Perfecting my very chaotic interpretation of the running man and cabbage patch dance moves to Paula Abdul. Don't judge me. Chris Cornell..now you're talking. Hair swinging wild and shirtless in the movie Singles. Black Hole Sun had a cd groove in in it where the laser had hit the track so many many times.
Anyhoo - My pointless outpouring of love (for music) is for a mix tape that Carol Ann gave Trosclair. As this was how I met Carol Ann and You. I can't remember all of the songs on the cd - but there was Beer (RBG), Clown (Korn), Battle of Who Could Care Less (Ben Folds) - some Lagwagon..some Dismemberment plan.. and others.. but it set a trend for not always listening to what's on the radio or eating straight up Applebees -- and finding that a unhip girl from the mountains has something in common with a beach girl with a nose ring.
My first musical crush was Sebastian Bach from Skid Row. "I Remember You" was #1 on the MTV Top 20 countdown for like 3 months, and I knew to get home by 4pm or whenever #1 would come on to catch it. I remember hanging around the magazine aisle in 7-11 to read lyrics in Hit Parader or Circus or one of those "metal" versions of Tiger Beat.
But alas, my only exposure to Dinosaur Jr. was "Feel the Pain", and that was because there was a weird guy who made his own radio station in my town that was run completely off of a hard drive. There were no announcers so if you wanted to know who sung a song, you'd have to call him (if he was around to answer the phone) and sing the song to him to find out. The cool part was he'd usually offer to give you the CD if you could get to the "studio", which was a room over his garage, which made that a non-option. One time in 12th grade we were doing some kind of fundraiser & were asking local businesses for donations, so I called Chuck (the radio guy) and he gave us a giant box of CDs. I'm not even ashamed to admit I filched some of them suckers. Like the Fishbone double CD, and I think that DGC Rarities album with "Jamie" by Weezer.
As a footnote...Sebastian Bach did a show freshman year at Peabody's (just had to google what the name of that place was. I feel very old and alzheimerszy right now). I felt obligated to go, so I did & it was so, so bad. I think he was wearing a gold lame' shirt & there were definitely pyrotechnics, and he was definitely fat. I guess once you get off a steady diet of jack daniels & cocaine you tend to pork up.
I love you guys! You make me laugh so hard. At work. Thanks!
Peabodys! LOL
I think "I Remember You" going to that show. And being disappointed in his, um, growth.
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