From Song O The Day

Alright, Touch of Gray……How many of you read the title and winced? Show of hands. Or maybe the Grateful Dead makes you wince. Or maybe it’s the Eagles (Hotel California?). I know someone here loves Hotel California.

This website is comprised of a group of serious music fans (probably serious art fans in general) and what irks the serious music fan more than a song that takes a great not hugely mainstream band into the mainstream? What drives “serious” music fans crazier than hearing a band they’ve loyally followed for years blasting from the radio of some Kookabear’s Audi convertible at a stop light on Van Ness? Nothing, right? Maybe I should speak for myself. That shit drives me nuts.

And it’s not only music, sometimes its fashion, or literature or the use of slang, or a brand of smokes, a particular cocktail and on and on. Let’s stick with music for now though.

Back in the first couple of years of High School, when drawing all over my binder was a cool and acceptable thing to do, I had THE DOORS scrawled all over my shit. I was in a serious Jim Morrison stage……doesn’t everyone go through a Doors stage, you know, right when you start getting high and just have to be different. That’s when the Doors can really latch on. Actually I think that Jim Morrison just got stuck in that phase and that kind of summarizes Jim Morrison…………I’m digressing some, back to my diatribe on my personal artistic elitism (now do you see where this is going)……..Back in the notebook scribbling stage I remember one specific conversation I had that was replayed in some form or fashion, with different bands/songs, countless times over the years. It went something like this:

Random cute 14 year old girl in Algebra class: “Oh, you like The Doors, me too. I love that song Light Your Fire. That movie was pretty cool, I watched it at midnight last weekend when my parents were drinking wine with the neighbors.”

What a great conversation starter. A girl I only kind of know reads my binder and comments on a potential mutual interest. Not only has she taken an interest in me and what I like but she’s now highlighted that a) she does things here parents wouldn’t approve of and b) she’s down with movies primarily about drugs and lots of random sex. All in one short and innocent, ice breaking statement.

How should a 14 year old E Tuck respond? Be stoked, be nice, suggest re-watching the movie together the next time her parents are getting wasted with the neighbors and maybe, just maybe, get a little titty. Stupid hindsight.

Instead, how does young E Tuck respond:

“Light MY Fire is like the worst song the Doors sing. You probably only have the greatest hits album. You obviously don’t REALLY listen to the Doors” Spoken with contempt as I return to inartistic doodling……What an Asshole.

You see, I couldn’t help it, the Doors were MY band, this girl couldn’t understand. Remember White Men Can't Jump? “You can’t hear Jimmy.”

And it went on like that for years. At the end of High School it was Punk Rock, then Hip Hop, then throwback 80’s jams.

“Oh you listen to punk? Whose your favorite band? Oh Blink 182, Green Day? Right, you’re an idiot.”

“Your into Outkast? You really like that song Mrs. Jackson. Right, you’re an idiot.”

When I moved to the East Coast in Summer of 1997 hearing the Sublime/Sublime album blasting out of dorm rooms on campus made me so angry I didn’t listen to the album again until 2005….at least in public.

My snobbery applied to greatest hits albums, popular radio songs, bands that became exceptionally popular (Green Day was ruined for me….and still pretty much is), popular books (I hated the Kite Runner, refused to read the Davinci Code). I wouldn't go to this bar, eat at that restaurant, where gear of that brand.

At the end of the day it has always been about my ego. How else am I going to keep my edge, to clearly differentiate myself from the people around me, to ensure everyone knows how well read, musically versed, in touch with street style I am?

Over the last couple of years I’ve been making an effort to take the ego out of it, to figure out what I like and what I don’t like regardless of the image I would like to portray. It's getting better I think. You probably still are not going to see me reading the new Michael Lewis novel on a bus or wearing a striped shirt out at night but I think it's getting better. And really, what do I know, Opera’s Book club is reading Joyce’s Dubliners this month.

Back to Touch of Grey. Go on, give it a listen. Admit it. It’s a pretty good track.