2009-03-16

Something to crawl into...

In recent years I've become something of a recluse. Actually, it's more like I've just accepted the fact that there are certain social situations that are going to make me uncomfortable, and so I choose to avoid them, unless I HAVE to go.

Anything involving Kristin Hersh falls into that "HAVE to" category.

By and large, I tend to not indulge in displays of egregious "fannishness." I find that fan "communities," by and large, are rather like pissing contests for the incontinent. I can't be bothered with it, and sometimes I wonder what it would be like if I became successful to the point where I had "fans." Would they have a message board where they all brag about how they've been reading me since my site had all the pulp fiction covers, or since before I quit drinking? Because honestly, that would SUCK.

I digress. I will endure a huge club crowd and all the associated mental ickiness to see Kristin Hersh.

I was in high school when I first heard Throwing Muses. I was introduced to them by my friends Judy and Raziel. I had never heard anything like it before, and I was totally enraptured. There was something about the music that was almost too painfully beautiful to listen to, on top of the driving mathematics of it. I wanted to crack each song open, like a telephone, and pull it apart to see how it worked and if I could put it back together. It was, and still is, like hearing a language you don't speak, and yet are able to understand.

Good music should do that. You should be able to want to crawl into a song.

It used to frustrate me that I couldn't write a song, other than the jokey shit I'd pen with PK or about my sister's then-boyfriend. It made me sad that I couldn't pick up my guitar or sit in front of the piano and just CREATE something. I understand now that I'm meant to channel different things, in a different way. And I appreciate all the more the people who can create that moment that you want to crawl into, however they manage to do it.

I think I met the greatest artist in the world the other day on the subway. The train pulled into Mass. Ave. station, and through the open doors I saw a little girl waiting on the other side of the platform. She was maybe five and dressed the way that five-year-olds do: in all their favorite clothes, regardless of whether or not they match. We looked at each other through the doors, and as they closed she waved to me. I waved back, and her whole face just lit up as the train pulled away.

It was absolutely something I could crawl into, and I do.

lisamcc at 2:18 p.m.

2 comments so far
mumma
2009-03-17 20:23:34
Sure it wasn't Kaleigh?
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Jess
2009-03-18 14:53:09
I feel the same way. Jeff pretty much writes a new song every day. He has a recorder that literally has 200 song ideas on it. I gots nothin'. I, too, have accepted that my lot falls elsewhere. Hey Lees, I'M your fan! So you got THAT going for you.
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