young volcano

just barely a decade ago, my mom pulled up to my high school in our family minivan with an unfamiliar record thundering from the car stereo, one she explained that she had randomly heard about and bought earlier that day. the verve pipe’s underneath, a quirky pop gem produced by fountains of wayne’s adam schlesinger, was a seismic shift from her last couple of music finds, one of which had led to her rounding the corner to the front of the school blasting “let’s get high” by dr. dre and the other being the blueprint by jay-z. underneath quickly joined forces with the blueprint and ben folds’ first solo record, rockin’ the suburbs, to form the soundtrack to the fall, an unlikely september minivan trifecta. ja rule’s pain is love, sadly, did not make the cut. which reminds me of a question that pops into my head at least once a month- i wonder what ja rule is doing right now?*

anyway, several autumns later, i found myself in another minivan with that very album cranked, on the way into brooklyn with syd, for either a) a show, b) a tour, c) irresponsible drunkenness or, most likely, d) all of the above. i remember it being one of those rare moments where you rediscover something that once blew your mind, and instead of having to sheepishly admit that you once loved it while acknowledging that it no longer does much for you (or the human race), it winds up and knees you in the junk even harder than it did the first time.

the best records seem to attach themselves not only to specific moments in time, but to recurring seasons, repeating scenarios. when i put underneath on the other day, i put it on because the songs sound like the changing of the leaves to me- they sound like the shedding of skin and the bittersweet feeling of bracing for inescapable change. but when i sat down and closed my eyes, i found myself looking at what i think i’ll always envision from the opening jangle of “only words” through the somber slink of “gotta move on”: a snapshot of myself in the fall, with a mentor, in a minivan- looking fondly at a snapshot of myself in the fall, with a mentor, in a minivan.

*he is in prison.

while i oscillate between zen platitude and borderline neurosis regarding the final frontier of my new record, which is the question of exactly how to visually represent the 37 minutes and 16 seconds to which an astounding portion of my life 2007-2011 amounts, i’ve decided to re-investigate the humble origins of my recording career* and immerse myself back in recording whatever comes to mind, as quickly as possible, on the same kind of shitty, featureless tape recorder that my parents gave me when i was two or three years old.

full disclosure: i have no idea where that dual-deck, technicolor playskool behemoth currently lies, so i’m using an old 4-track- but trust me, the results are equally stunning in their sheer shittiness as well as their potential for future embarrassment as the day i first started dubbing tapes of myself singing nonsense and bestowing them upon confused relatives as holiday gifts. but this, my friends, is the key. i think it’s time to do something every day that could be a little embarrassing (or at least awkward to try and explain) somewhere down the line- otherwise i could sit here all day weighing pros and cons in a sort of overly calculated cost-benefit analysis of the self, and nothing fun or outrageous would really ever happen.

this is going to be my home for a little while, and i invite you to join me for as long as i can think of fun memories to revisit through the narrow lens of the analog medium at hand- whether they’re covers of songs written by idols of mine or covers of tunes by friends who’ve inspired me (often, i’m sure this will end up being both), or re-imagined versions of old tunes of my own, i think this should be a fun way to tell whatever story it is that i have to tell. so pass this around, check back for the next random thing i can’t get out of my head, and let me know if there’s something you think i should try (even if your reasoning is utterly sinister and/or you’re merely trying to beckon me toward the edge of rationality- that’s the point).

the first tune i tried is nothing more than a song that’s been lodged in my brain all week, a wonderfully simple meditation on the passing of time from ryan adams’ new record, ashes and fire. now that i think about it, the sentiment captures exactly what i’m trying to do here: remind myself that the simple act of being able to look back and carry on is a lucky enough coincidence- it shouldn’t matter whether it is, was or will be embarrassing, painful or just plain unbelievable. are we really who we used to be? am i really who i was? only if we’re lucky now.

*which, now that i think about it, is kind of on infinite loop set at “humble origin,” so what i really mean is “that period of time where i had neither the interest in nor ability to engage in the quality control of my musical output.”