That whole scenario is dated. I was sixteen. Now I'm twenty-seven. I bought a CD. Now that process is almost archaic. I bought a Weezer album. (And, let's face it: even though I'll defend the Green Album till I die there's no denying that their relevance really died with the nineties, and even the Green Album that I have such a strong connection to was simply a reflection and reminiscence of simpler times gone by.) Hell, even Best Buy doesn't seem to have weathered the stormy times since then.
Now, eleven years later, I repeated the process and generated results that were---somewhat shockingly---incredibly similar. I let my class out early (I didn't need permission) and drove my 2001 Chevy Impala to Best Buy to purchase the first Eve 6 album since 2003. I returned to my Impala, tore the plastic off my purchase, and inserted the disc into the GM factory CD-player (with cassette deck) that's in my car's dash, and sat and listened. "Curtain" blasted through it with every decibel of force that my (much-improved) GM factory speakers could muster, and I felt like I felt on May 15, 2001, eleven years earlier.
While parts of this process were contrived in order to mirror its predecessor (I can't remember the last time I bought a CD, and it's been even longer since I've bought one at Best Buy, so long that I struggled with a bit of a learning curve), the part that matters was absolutely genuine. The part that matters is the ability and opportunity to experience a level of sheer feeling through music. I can't remember exactly what I thought of "Don't Let Go" the first time I heard it on that day in 2001. What I do remember is leaving that CD in my car for almost six months after that without changing even for a day to anything else and sitting in my room and listening to the CD on repeat for the entire day when I should have been toiling away as a sophomore in high school. While I can't be sure of the specifics (i.e. what I made of the lyrics, what crescendos and choruses and guitar riffs really moved me) I know that I felt more that day. Time slowed down. Moments became memories.
Today, similarly, time slowed down and I was opened up to a depth of feeling and of life that can best be described as transcendent.
Today, though, maybe thanks to the eleven extra years of experience and... ahem... "wisdom" that I've accrued, that state of heightened sensitivity led me on a sort of existential journey through that song and myself (I have a forty-five minute drive to and from work).
First, here's the song. [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=ZKnYDxroZ8w]
This song seems an excellent way to begin an album that marks what will hopefully be a triumphant return to form after a prolonged absence in which the band broke up, tried to start up other things, dealt with personal stuff that guys in bands always have to deal with (here, specifically, it seems Max is dealing with an alcohol dependency so often associated with the "rock 'n roll" lifestyle), and then finally got back together and wound up almost right back where they started from. So far it's my favorite on the album. I've listened to it probably thirty or more times today, and I attribute that mostly to the chorus:
I tried to forgive you
For the shit you put me through
But it's just the hardest thing to do
So I guess it's goodbye brother, goodbye Rock 'n Roll
Guess it's goodbye to the only life I know
It's a shame you couldn't just say you were hurting
I will see you on the other side of the curtain
Here, where Max addresses this "Rock 'n Roll" that he's ironically saying goodbye to on the initial track of his first album in nine years, I get it. That's the feeling that I've been meditating on since hearing this the first time today, and it's one I've thought about a lot before. See, he's got this relationship that is abusive in that it leads him to do things that are really bad for him and it makes it incredibly difficult to avoid temptations that lead down dangerous paths and it inevitably leads to more abuse because it makes him vulnerable and there's bound to be bad reviews and people saying you should have stayed away and part of him probably wishes he would have stayed away but there's this... something that keeps him at it.
Why would someone stay in an abusive relationship with his profession even when he knows it's in his best interest to leave it behind?
Why do people try so hard to hold on to something that they know is past?
Why would someone stay in a job they enjoy but barely pays the bills instead of trading it in for a boring, mindless one that pays more than enough to pay the bills and buy a new car and live comfortably and never have to worry about making ends meet again?
What is that something that keeps them at it?
Passion.
It's a manifestation of love and it can't be controlled, and even if it makes you hate it and wish that it would just slough off of your soul and fade away like dead skin into the wind you know, deep down, that you're lucky to have it and feel it and experience it. And if you've managed to make it this far and you're still chasing it and you haven't yet managed to murder it despite your desperate attempts and your sleepless nights and the tears you've cried trying to choke it out, consider yourself lucky. There are struggles ahead, to be sure. The reviews won't all be positive. But passion isn't something that can be resurrected. Once it's dead there's no going back. So if it's still there, either on the surface or suffocating below some prescribed alter-ego, take heed. Nurture it. Follow it through the ups and downs and the dull days and sleepless, stormy nights. Chase it. Keep it in sight, even when you can't run or walk or even stand. It's a universal human emotion, and these are rare in a day and age when all the overarching truths have fallen away and given rise to questions without answers.
And most importantly, I'll see you on the other side of the curtain.
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