Dear Friends,
I’ve finally started thinking about an exit strategy for blogging every day. I don’t see myself continuing with a daily blog after this year. I could change my mind, but there are several things that I’ve been thinking about that sound kind of good in my own head.
For one, I’m coming up on a thousand straight days of writing about 1000 words a day. That’s a million words written in less than three years and that does not include the writing I’ve done as a teacher and as a journalist. Those numbers sound pretty huge to me.
I’m also feeling like I’m a bit written out when it comes to talking about myself without doing something more serious with it like writing a book. Maybe it is time to really start diving into the stories I’ve told here and figuring out what to do with them.
I appreciate those of you who visit here on a regular basis. I don’t think I will just turn my back on Ergonomic Mischief, but maybe a daily blog is not ideal anymore. Only time will tell, but I have some new ideas I want to mess around with and some old ones that I need to finish.
*****
The first week of school was a long one and I am tired. I am jazzed, too, to dive in and really start working with the students. I need to invest a lot of time into so many of them that I’m not sure where I am going to find the time, but it will happen the way it is supposed to happen.
The last couple of days, the newness of the year has worn off and I’m beginning to see some true colors coming out. Compared to previous years, this group is a little more docile, but also a lot less motivated to learn. The real test of the next month or so is going to be how to get more buy in from some of these kids. I must figure out what buttons to push and how to push them in a way that helps them want to learn and be better.
This is going to take time and patience. I have some of each, but truly, not enough. It’s punk rock time, I guess, like Joe Strummer once said.
*****
I was headed to Shelton’s memorial today, but realized I got my days wrong.
I’m so damn sad about it. You know, good people seem to be getting harder and harder to find these days and Shelton was a good one. I will be more prepared on 9/7.
It's been tough lately with all the recent loss that I have not quite really resolved. I had one pretty good cry when I found out my uncle Tom died a few weeks back, but the rest of these recent ones are kind of just bubbling underneath the surface.
*****
Speaking of familiar faces, the record I am writing about today is very, very special to me.
*****
Bill G. and I became friends at some point during the second half of my sophomore year. I don’t remember how we became friends, but I thought he was about the coolest guy at Deer Valley High School. He was a junior when we met, but he always seemed just a bit older to me for some reason back in those days like he knew a lot more than most people did.
He turned me on to The Damned. I’d heard a little bit of them, but Bill really took me under his Damned wing and showed me how great they are. We listened to The Black Album a lot and it was the first record of theirs I bought.
As with many of the other records I have written about this year, I wore that sucker out.
“Wait For The Blackout” is seared into my brain, I think. Even to this day, when I hear that song kick in, I am amped up. Rat Scabies’ drums are so big and just perfect, too. The song challenges you to soar with it.
I think that is what I love about The Damned the most. They stick out their hands and say, “Come with us.” If you go, you are always handsomely rewarded.
“Lively Arts” and “Silly Kids Games” are both amazing, as well, and Paul Grey is the fucking man. The bass lines on this record are just, as the kids say, “Sick.” I’ve wanted to be part of a Damned cover band for a long time and as a bass player, one of the reasons I want to do it is to make myself raise my game several notches. If I could play this record, for example, I would be proud as hell of myself.
“Drinking About My Baby” was probably my first favorite song off this record. Billy asked me to be part of a little band he was putting together to play the Deer Valley talent show, but I chickened out. He wanted me to sing this song in front of the crowd, but I got scared. I had never done anything like that before.
Time machine, I need you now. In a parallel universe, I took the challenge and ended up in a completely different place in life.
I love “Twisted Nerve,” too. It’s got a different feel than the first four songs on the record, but it also showed 15-year-old me that a punk band could have many moods. This is another reason I love The Damned so much. There are many different moods for the band.
“Hit or Miss” takes you back to the punk rock train. It sounds very much like a song that Brian James would have written when he was still in the band, but Captain Sensible’s guitar work is exquisite. That solo just purrs.
“Dr Jekyll & Mr. Hyde” shows off the psychedelic goth side of The Damned as the B side gets going. I remember having my skull torn open by this one and all kinds of wild visions tossed in while listening to this one while on acid. I’m pretty sure it was the soundtrack to a full-on cartoon hallucination at one point.
“My clothes will impress you and my claws will undress you.”
Paul Grey kind of rules on this one, too. The guitars are fairly reserved through a lot of the song, but the bass is hyper-present, and the keyboards help the vibe. “Sin is a way of life…” and “two for the price of one.” I’m so glad that Dave Vanian started writing his own lyrics after the early stuff. When we talked once about a tour they were doing, he told me how huge it was for him to start contributing to the band and I told him it was at that point when I thought they really started to find themselves.
It was a fun moment in that conversation, for sure. I think I made him blush, although his blush is not perceptible to the human eye.
“Sick of This and That” is a fun little rocker. “History of the World Part 1” is quite the undertaking. “I just hit the ground! Boy, have I arrived! Tell the dinosaurs that they just won’t survive.” I love that opening bit. Hans Zimmer’s synth work is excellent here. The fucking Damned were so ahead of their time. I really think that music fans will continue to discover them for generations to come and probably just be in awe.
“13th Floor Vendetta” should have warned us all about was to come with Phantasmagoria, but at the point where I was living and breathing The Black Album, I wasn’t ready to see it. As I’ve gotten older, I really like Phantasmagoria, but when it came out, I was a little curious about it.
The piano at the end of the song seals the deal for me now. When the guitar joins in towards the end, I just know things are going to be all right. Nothing bad can happen with this song is on.
“Therapy” finishes off the version I first bought on vinyl. It’s the 7:39 minute version, but I love the slightly shorter version, too, on the CD. Such a good song either way, though. Rat and Paul Grey flex a little on the beginning, but so does Cap. Those guys can just flat out play.
On the CD, which I bought after I kind of switched formats in the early 90s, I love that “Curtain Call” is there. Talk about another great song to listen to with a head full of acid. Strap in and turn on. I’m too old for that stuff now, but as a teenager, holy cow!
The Damned might just be the best band ever.
*****
See you tomorrow.
"I Can't Be Quiet to Save My Life" by AI.
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