Running in the half-light

Is spandex a versatile material? I have internally debated such a notion and found myself at a standstill, because there actually is nothing to debate. Instead, I began to think about how odd it was for my mother to dress her 6 year-old boy in spandex bicycle shorts that had a neon green "racing stripe" down each thigh. The material itself is only used in clothing. One may suggest that due to its elasticity it is in fact a versatile material, but I think I would disagree with such a suggestion. The suggestors makes suggestions based on presuppositions that these suggestions they suggest will be generally accepted as apt observations or factual comments, not mere suggestions. Spandex certainly is versatile in terms of how it can wrap itself around ones body (or a 6 year-old boy's little 6 year-old bum) due to its elasticity, but as an actual material it has little versatility in terms of usage. Superman would probably disagree with me and go so far as to claim he invented spandex (typical "All-American" ego-mania, like Al Gore's self-professed creation of the internet).

If spandex is versatile, Mr. Kent, then so too is morality. Superman certainly saves the world (or, at least the part of the world within a 10-mile radius of Metropolis...so typical of us urbanites to completely shun the suburbs....but really, what the fuck is the GTA? If I was Superman I sincerely doubt I would want to fly to fucking Mississauga), but yet is deceitful in his Clark Kent guise. Is he protecting his identity, or essentially hiding from his duties? Considering that people do not know where Superman is when he is in his mild-mannered Clark Kent guise, how can they reach him to seek his saving grace? The original Superman actually had an even looser moral code, where he would carelessly toss villains around city streets, potentially hurting Metropolis pedestrians. Even worse (gasp!), the original Superman of the 1930s actually helped minorities. Less obsessed with having a pissing contest about his superhuman strength with jerk-offs like Lex Luther, the original Superman actually stopped men from beating their wives (presumably while the men were wearing undershirts) and broke up mobs that planned to lynch black civilians. Realizing that no "All-American" hero would do such a thing, the new editors altered Superman's character in the 1940s and instead taught children important life lessons like how to blow up bad guys on city streets and have snappy little quips to spit out as you do so. 

Thinking of Superman enacting explosions on city streets brings me to another point: his name. His original name on Krypton was Kal-El. Hmmm. Does that not sound a little Muslim? So, Superman is roaming the streets, blowing shit up, named Kal-El, he certainly is not Christian (I have been unable to find the issue "Superman attends Midnight Mass" [although, Superman looks like he would be from a Protestant background anyway....or he could be Irish Catholic come to think of it...]), and he can fly. Not even Jesus could fly. Therefore, if you read Superman comics, the terrorists win.

On the other hand, Superman's misuse of his powers is a genuinely heroic American trait. By neglecting to help the little factions truly in need to instead have wank-offs on the city streets and allow everyone to see how badass and powerful he is, Superman is almost making a documentary about global warming in which a substantial portion of it is a whiny lamentation on how he unfairly lost the Presidency in 2000. The looseness of that moral code is nothing like spandex. I would know, I used to wear spandex bicycle shorts.

In Rainbows (Disc 2)

Ascension (A Misconception)

My saviour is made of straw and felt

Upon his head a hat may rest

He wards off crows and deathly ranks

Propped upright by wood is his preferred stance

My saviour did not die on account of my sins

I rarely shout "Hosanna!" as I parallel his fence

This yeast shall not bake to a bodily bread;

These grapes shall not ferment to a hemoglobic toast

My saviour has feet that dare not tread

Though stationary, he knows all of the world

Loosely dressed in ancestral cloth,

He feeds on needles, pins, and bran

My saviour led me once to love and repentance

Apostled upon the ground, merciless at his feet

Hearkened by silver and its light that shines and blinds,

I enacted betrayal upon supple lips

My saviour is propped upright on a wooden stitch

He oversees my fields sown with silvery flesh

As chariot wheels threaten to paint my crops red,

His feet shuffle seditiously and absolve me of the act

Don't look away, it's just a sanitized exploding airplane.

Seeing as it is in style for "scene" bands to be breaking up like it's going out of style (see what I did there? fucking scenesters...), it would be most fashionable of me (or would it?) to address the unfortunate losses the "scene" has suffered recently. 

Unable to cope with the sheer mediocrity of their existence, The Early November decided to call it quits. That last triple-disc effort was hardly even that––really, they put effort into that? THAT. Repetition of the same word in a sentence irritates me. TEN put on a façade of being over-ambitious with their triple disc release, The Mother, The Mechanic, and The Path, but it took very little for me to see past the framing "concept" of the three discs and recognize what the album really is: a contrived piece of crap. Oh Ace Enders, your childhood was difficult. Your parents only took you to Olive Garden once every two weeks, while the rest of your suburban New Jersey (isn't all of New Jersey a suburb?) friends went every week. Mommy, Mommy, Jimmy got a Super Nintendo, why can't I? Thankfully, Ace Enders already has a solo project in place to continue the strain of mediocrity. The overlord of contrived "scene" mediocrity, Tom Delonge, has even invited Enders to go on tour.

Moving on to another band of contrived assholes, Matchbook Romance has disbanded. Ha, sort of a pun. Yet not. Nothing relating to MBR is clever. Apparently, they ran out of musical styles to latch onto and mimic (poorly) and were thus forced to call it quits. Each album was just a muffled echo of musical fads that reached their peak six months prior: West for Wishing latched onto the sing/scream post-hardcore trend a few Warped Tours too late, Stories and Alibis is a poor man's rendition of pop-punk in the vein of Fallout Boy, and Voices (the greatest travesty of all) has the audacity to mimic the progressive and off-kilter strides of Brand New, Thrice, and any asshole who downloaded a few tracks from Kid A and felt "inspired." I hope the corpse of Matchbook Romance rots while fertilizing the ground surrounding it, providing fresh crops to those who are hungry. 

Also Pisolita and a few other jerkwad bands broke up, remember? Ha, me neither. Seeing as I am growing weary of talking about mediocre bands who have broken up, I will get to my main point: The Blood Brothers. Such an unfortunate loss. Moreover, an unfortunate loss for me personally, because I only started to get into them a few months ago. Yes, they certainly have been making music for 10 years and I could have gotten with the fucking program long ago, but it's a little late to go searching for your lost hamster now, isn't it?!

Call them what you will (I've heard them referred to as "art punk," "avant-garde post-hardcore," and "experimental hardcore") in an attempt to claim ownership of them ("Oh, I'm really into art punk lately. The Blood Brothers are like my faves..hehe"), but I doubt many have even scratched the surface of this band's complexity and sheer genius. Johnny Whitney's high-pitched screams are what that bumbling intern of a singer from Billy Talent wishes he could ascend to (pitch-wise and talent-wise). 

Lyrically, the Brothers reach a healthy balance of surrealism and kitsch that causes you to ironically smirk as you ponder the benefits of doing psychoactive drugs. A fine example of this is on the track "Huge Gold AK-47." To begin with, the song's title alone jumps at you, creeps its way through your nostrils and attacks your brain, tickling it repeatedly (I realize that this appears to be a cocaine analogy, especially after my comment about psychoactive drugs, but you must consider the following: 

1. Cocaine does not tickle your brain, it grabs your brain and twists it, socking one to your central nervous system
   
2. Cocaine is not a psychoactive drug
3. I did not realize the parallels between my ingestion of "Huge Gold AK-47" and the most popular form of cocaine ingestion [you can also smoke it, inject it, even chew the coca leaves] until after writing this blog and reading it over
4. I do admit that similarly to cocaine, the Blood Brothers can be addictive and cause a certain sense of euphoria, but they do not increase your blood pressure or cause long-term health risks

Done and done. Now back to the blog...) causing different thought processes to mingle, entangle, struggle, become one. Yes, the song is about war with imperialist implications in one sense, but the title is somewhat farcical, it creates a caricature of war. Lyrics range from surreal (yet still straightforward), "Those decadent war swans/With faces half drawn/Slinging blood-soaked carols at the slave ship sun," to comically over the top, "Huge gold Ak-47! Huge gold AK-47!/C'mon, it's 4 am, kick down the gate/And spray your ammo like champagne." By creating this type of caricature, we can actually take the song more seriously if we would like to. There are far too many songs about war that really are poor attempts to be intellectual and save the world (Green Day, anyone?), but do not actually represent anything true to the issue. Instead, they are the insensitive and uninformed ramblings of white suburbanites. In the case of "Huge Gold AK-47," it can exist in its own realm. Initially the entire song can be looked at as  a far-fetched song about some sort of otherworldly war, done so in a kitschy manner (think of that movie Stargate). This allows one to separate the song from the endless catalog of war songs and then begin to look at it autonomously when one realizes that there is more to it than bizarre imagery and some whimsical repetition. It is only then that you can appreciate the genius of the lyrics: 

Oh, there's a field inside your face

With breezes sweet as chardonnay

Violins dangling from willow branches

But the soldiers stripped it from your skin

Cracked its ribs in the kitchen

Dressed it in drag and pissed on every inch

On top of all this, the music just sounds fucking cool. Fast-paced, powerful, repetitive in a call-to-arms kind of way. It's music you can listen to on the subway and find yourself nodding your head, then moving your shoulders to and fro, then really nodding your head spastically, open palms banging your knees along with the beat, then in a flurry of self-consciousness realizing that you appear to other passengers to be having a seizure and thinking "perhaps I should tone it down a bit, they keep looking at me from the corners of their eyes," but then not giving a damn and continuing. Fuckers. 

Blood Brothers - Young Machetes