Asshole of the Century

Tuesday, August 31, 2010

The Consolations of the Damned

There is something about the notion of predestination that speaks to me. It is deep-seated. Part of it might be some Calvinist echo that has been deposited into the back of my psyche, like they tried to do through dreams in the summer blockbuster “Inception,” a trigger of some ancient memory, either part of the collective unconscious that we are all share as Americans, or the more specific memories of my Scotch-Irish forebears. But while I was raised Presbyterian, historically among the most dour Calvinists of the bunch, we were California Presbyterians, which doesn’t really count. Growing up, my most salient memory of our church was of a pastor riffing on the prospect of alien life forms while officiating over my grandfather’s funeral. It wasn’t the kind of church where they talked about Calvin’s belief, formed through detailed calculations and a meticulous reading of the Bible, that there are exactly 244,000 elect in the history of the world, predestined for heaven by the ineluctable wisdom of our creator, and that the rest of us are essentially damned from birth.

The notion of there being a limited number of “chosen” to receive a full measure of God’s blessings intuitively makes sense to me, and I don’t think this is just because I was born an American or raised Presbyterian. Sure it is a brutal and rather pessimistic view of the cosmos. But, for better or worse, the idea of a limited elect also seems like a rather clear-eyed assessment of how the world works. It is blessedly devoid of the wish-fulfillment and fantasies of most religions, and doesn’t make any apologies for the seemingly cruel imbalances of fate. Hey, look around without the rose-colored blinders on, and why would anyone think that the universe doesn’t play favorites? No one likes to live in a world where almost all of us stand tried and convicted before we are even born. But who’s to say it’s not true?

“It’s not fair.” That, of course, is the eternal lament of the child, which was followed in our home, as I’m sure it still is in millions around the country, with my mom’s predictable refrain: “Yeah, well life’s not fair.” In other words, get used to it. Which is what I imagine will be the response by whatever deity set this entire mess in motion if we happen to have the opportunity to meet him/her/it on judgment day. It is indicative of the hubris of the modern age that for some reason we believe that we are the ones who should be judging God, rather than the other way around.

Using whatever cosmology you want to set the scales, by this point in my life, it is pretty clear that I am not one of the “chosen ones.” Nor are virtually any of my friends. By just about any standard, we fall short. In aggregate and as individuals, most of us are not particularly moral, or caring, or sympathetic. We certainly don’t have the instinctive empathy for the suffering of our fellow man that seems to be the standard currency in most religious faiths.

But we still have our moments of redemption, and for many of us, these moments tend to happen at the music club and the concert hall. For me, music remains the greatest of the arts (followed closely by literature and then architecture). This past spring, on my most recent trip to L.A., while at a party full of music industry nerds that at the time seemed like just another wasted evening, some 2nd tier record producer told me that one of the great things about music is that it somehow manages to express the essence of an era through sound. Through the resonance of vibrating frequencies in the air, musicians manage to construct an abstract mathematics that conveys what it means to live in that particular place and time on our planet. In my own mangling of this thought: Music comes closest to expressing the essence of our souls. And for the lonely and the fallen to be granted moments of such communion through music speaks more strongly to the existence of a benevolent God than anything I know.

I’ve been granted a few of these moments this summer, the most recent on Sunday, when Iggy Pop and the Stooges played the Riviera Theatre. I’ll not bore the uninitiated with a lengthy rundown of the concert, other than to note that Iggy was in fine fiddle, stalking the stage: part animal, part showman, part dervish. And that the Stooges provided a fitting band of communicants. Mike Watt hobbled out with his broken leg and his grizzled mien. Scott Asheton looked like an ex-biker out to smoke a cig on a break during his 12-step meeting. Only James Williamson, looking well-fed and well-coifed with that flowing blond hair of his, looked a bit out of place; but of course he was just a reminder that original Stooges guitarist Ron Asheton had passed away not long after the band's last tour, in 2009. In other words, the Stooges are scarred stars for scarred people.

The current concert tour is based on a fairly flawed conceit, but a common one in the touring world these days, which is for an aging band to replicate a seminal album from decades past, in this case 1973’s “Raw Power,” the third and final album by the Stooges and the only one on which Williamson played guitar. It may have sounded like a good idea, but the Stooges were essentially a singles (rather than an album) band, with a smattering of great songs on each record. While even the weaker songs on “Raw Power” are solid tunes, you couldn’t help thinking, “Boy I hope they play “Loose” or “I Wanna Be Your Dog” tonight.” Which is why I went a little ape-crazy when they broke into the opening chords of “1970” (off of "Funhouse"): “Out of my mind on a Saturday night/1970 rollin’ in sight/Radio burnin’ up above/Beautiful baby, feel my love/All night, till I, blow away/I feel alright/I fell alright/Feel alright.”

That is the beauty of the Stooges in a nutshell (so to speak). They have the rare ability to combine both the sexuality and the defiance of youth. As a young punk rocker, I unfortunately only mimicked the angry side. It’s too bad that I didn’t have the good sense to channel Iggy Pop, rather than Johnny Rotten. Because an underappreciated facet of the Stooges is how hard they swing. Maybe a lot of guys don’t get that subtlety, but I think most of the ladies do. It was an aggressive, sweaty pit at the Riv, but one leavened by some heavy hip action from the healthy smattering of women in the crowd. Women were dancing, swaying, fondling their breasts (OK, I actually only saw one woman who was slowly rubbing her nipples, but that’s one more than you usually see at a rock show). For a 62-year old dude to inspire that kind of reaction is a mighty cool thing. Iggy, you still rock.

My August was book-ended by concerts. At the end of the month was the Stooges, while at the beginning, Melissa and I drove up to Milwaukee to see the National, who also rock, but in a totally different way. The Stooges get to your heart through the gut, while the National do it through your mind. Their songs are beautiful, lyrical, and reward repeated listening. But they still have a groove, and they get at some of the same things as the Stooges, just in a different manner.

“I’m a confident liar/Had my head in the oven so you’d know where I’ll be/I’ll try to be more romantic/I’ll try to believe everything you believe…. I was afraid/I’d eat your brains/‘CUZ I’M EVIL.”

The National had 2,000 otherwise seemingly upstanding Milwaukeeians shouting this chorus. To be clear, this song isn’t about a glorification of evil, nor is it the comic book evil of a heavy metal band. It is about something much more poignant and true: Evil as it is experienced by most of us, as a falling short, an inability to get outside our own little boxes. The National dropped a bunch of these moments upon us that night, these perfectly performed little gems that hinted at the dark tides that lurk within.

I have a wandering mind, even during moments of reverie. As the band played that night in Milwaukee, I waxed ecstatic over the idea that in this life, where seemingly the few are chosen, even us soiled and poorly-repaired souls are granted moments of intense joy, albeit in this case a surreptitious joy, found at night, in dark places. It makes me think that even an all-knowing, omnipotent God might have moments of pity, where he allows the damned their pleasures, and so he shielded us in that hall from His blinding gaze, at least for a couple of hours.

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