The best band you almost heard of

Great Moments In Music Licensing

Every time I watch the Oscars, I'm reminded of the fact that even had I not strayed away from the ordained path of film production after college, my chances of having the opportunity to thank God, the Academy, the Russian woman who does my waxing and the teachers of America were pretty slim. Not only was I was an outstandingly terrible director, but I wanted more than anything in the whole world to be a music supervisor. In the world of film school, that's like aspiring to be a key grip. No one thinks it's a real job and, even if it is, no one has any idea what it means other than it probably won't get you invited to Harvey Weinstein's after-party.

The argument could be made that giving out Oscars for music supervision is akin to giving Grammys to DJs. Although, to be fair, P. Diddy won a Grammy for essentially re-purposing The Police. So let's not get on our high horse, entertainment industry. On the other hand, I can understand the backlash. Movie soundtracks have largely become marketing tools that are littered with throwaway tracks from the distributing label's roster or exercises in bargain bin licensing, having nothing to do with the movie at all (maybe some current single gets a shout-out in the closing credits). And then "The O.C." slinks into popular consciousness, plays a different Spoon song over every Important Scene, and huzzah! Music supervision is the cool with the kids! (Don't get me started on Garden State because I might roll my eyes so hard that I'll do permanent damage.)

When I was 14 and largely unconcerned with my future beyond the next issue of TV Guide, I remember watching the mini-series adaptation of Stephen King's The Stand and being deeply effected by a single scene involving the music of Crowded House. I made the decision right then that if picking music that went in movies was an actual job, then that was the job for me. My parents thought this was as viable a career choice as when I had announced I was going to join the Thundercats when I grew up.

And still, despite awards for Best Assistant Director (retired in 1937, to the outrage of coffee-fetchers everywhere) and Best Original Song By Randy Newman, the Academy is still unwilling to recognize that music supervision done right is an art. Maybe it will happen someday, through lobbying or Graeme Ravell holding a member of the Academy hostage. Maybe they'll call it the Zach Braff Memorial Award For Excellence In Making An iMix For A Motion Picture. Who knows. But in the meantime I’d like to share a few of my favorite moments in music supervision, since these strokes of genius are unlikely to receive any formal recognition anytime soon. Naturally, I'll begin at the beginning.

"Don't Dream It's Over" / The Stand


I had just finished plowing through all 1000+ pages of the novel a month or so before this aired. For those unaware, The Stand asks what would happen if all but 5% of the world's population were wiped out in a matter of days by a highly contagious disease. And then Satan showed up. I'm disappointed that I couldn't find the clip of the way the song was actually used in the movie - underscoring a montage of shots of empty streets, bodies left where they fell, the few survivors mourning their loves ones while fleeing The Evil. A haunting portrait of a realistic apocalypse. I challenge you to find anything half as effective involving any combination of Mischa Barton and Death Cab For Cutie.


"Down With The Sickness" / Dawn of the Dead


Pure genius, especially given that it's a movie about zombies. When I saw this in the theater, I actually clapped. And no one does that anymore, except maybe if Jeremy Piven gets punched in the face because who doesn't want to punch Jeremy Piven? At this point in the film, Ving Rhames, et al have set up shop quite comfortably in a suburban mall and are making the best of it, despite the frenzied mob of brain-eating undead that's amassed in the parking lot. It's an excellent exercise in irony on several levels, not least of which is using Richard Cheese's version of a laughably over dramatic Disturbed song. I’d like to point out that I spent some time on IMDB, trying to find and credit the music supervisor (who also had the stroke of good taste to use the Stereophonics’ “Have A Nice Day” during the opening credits), but no such luck. They have a credit for the “third assistant accountant,” though. Just saying.


"Wise Up" / Magnolia


Generally I dislike Magnolia for being an overlong, indulgent, meandering mess (although it did paint a believable portrait of Tom Cruise as an insane cult leader - synergy!). However, I have to give Paul Thomas Anderson credit for the following: writing a screenplay inspired largely by the Aimee Mann songs he went on to use in the film and having the insane vision to employ this much-maligned technique of breaking the 4th wall. Just enough to emphasize the spectacularly relevant lyrics and connect each of the characters at a similar point in their individual downward spirals. I remember very few specifics from the film, but I've always thought of this scene as groundbreaking and a less than subtle example of what good supervision is supposed to achieve.


Opening Credits / Inside Man


I have an affection for Inside Man for two simple reasons: Clive Owen (who is hot) and the fact that it was both set and filmed two blocks from my apartment. The building that was used as Manhattan Trust Bank is now something called "Beaver Bar" - I don't even want to know - with a large yellow banner and a wry-looking cartoon beaver, enticing passers-by to "Come on in." I'll take a pass, thanks. But, really, one of the most excellent moments in the film happens in the first few frames: the remixed version of "Chaiyya Chaiyya" that plays over the opening credits captures both the uneasy multiculturalism of New York City as well as the impending cat-and-mouse between crook and cop. I half expected Spike to trot out some tired jam by Public Enemy. Happy surprises all around. And Clive Owen? Hot.

We should have that framed

Tracy is an only child. We commiserate about many things.

One day when I was in her living room, she pointed out, "We have a lot of pictures. Of me." This would prove to be an understatement akin to "Men In Black II is not a good movie" or "hot tar roofing is a bit messy." There are pictures of Tracy everywhere in her parents' house. I had never noticed it before, but of course as soon as she said it, it was all I saw. Tracy as a baby. Tracy at gymnastics. Tracy at the prom. Tracy at graduation. Tracy and the dog. If she wasn't standing next to me, I would have thought that Tracy had died in a tragic accident and her parents, overcome with grief, had turned their home into a shrine. It was a little JonBenet, to be honest.

I mean, I guess it makes sense. OK, well, maybe "sense" is overstating. But there's an expected amount of parental crazy that you put up with when you don't have any siblings to whom you can delegate it. You are simultaneously the most wonderful, special child in the whole word and the biggest fuck up. There is no little brother doing meth or older sister getting knocked up by her teaching assistant to which you can point and say, "Well, I might have cut 3rd period chem lab once or twice, but at least I'm not that bad." And there's no one else to distract them when they keep taking pictures of you. Some people have kitchens that are chicken-themed (this is true, I've been in one). The parents of one kid can have entire interior design schemes that are child-themed. It happens.

Except in my house. We had pictures of the cats (past and present), pictures of my aunt and uncle, and lots of ceramic animals on display. No one would ever come over and think that I had died in a terrible scooter accident and that my mother could only assuage her grief by surrounding herself with my image. Or that, you know, she had kids.

My living room only ever contained one picture of me. It was the 8x10 that came in package with my senior pictures. All of the packages of any school picture I've ever had included an 8x10. Why is that? At the time it was taken, my hair was too long, and I had recently been initiated into the cult of blond highlights, in the grand tradition of the Evans women. I am hugging a tree (not my idea), sort of smiling, and I look a little dazed. Dead in the eyes. You never look in pictures like you think you do in real life. So we framed it and put it in the living room, next to the ceramic fish. When I got my prom pictures back, I tried to frame the inevitable 8x10 and put it in the living room. Mom's response: "Jesus Christ, do we need to put the big one in a frame? Why do you keep getting the 8x10s?"

The last time I had a professional picture taken (not including the DMV) it was for my college graduation. I remember thinking precisely that at the time - this was the last time I would ever have a professional picture taken, unless I ever made Employee of the Month at the Costco I was sure I would end up working at. It was relief, really, since I never know what to wear for those things. They always tell you not to wear white, which isn't too hard when pretty much everything I've owned since 1994 has been in varying shades of black and brown. For picture day in my sophomore year of high school, I wore a Co-Ed Naked Volleyball t-shirt. It wasn't white, but I think they still ought to put that on the What Not To Wear list. Some people just don't know any better. Honestly, I have no idea what happened to my graduation pictures. I certainly don't have them, and I've never seen them hanging anywhere in Mom's house. It's probably for the best, since I look like a Stepford wife with the way they made me tilt my head.

A few months ago, I was standing in my mother's kitchen while we were cleaning up Christmas dinner. On the side of the fridge, there was a large picture of me leaning over a pool table, lining up a shot. Not a particularly flattering angle. Cooper had taken a bunch of shots at Crash Mansion one night, as he's wont to do, and I had forwarded some of them to Mom. Not thinking, of course, that she was going to print them out and decorate the kitchen.

"Mom, why the hell do you have this hanging up?"

"Well," she said, handing me a dish towel, "you never send me any pictures."

Then I noticed something on the bulletin board. It was a picture of Tracy.

Just Saying: Geek Rock Edition

The new Fall Out Boy video was on VH1 this morning.

Hey, guys?

Barenaked Ladies called. They want their schtick back.

But you can keep the eyeliner.

The song remains the same

There are two things that keep me sane when it all seems to have gone wrong (again): Annie Lennox and writing it all down. The latter isn't terribly practical, at least not in a public forum. Who wants to be one of those people of dubious mental stability on the subway, scribbling in a little notebooks and looking balefully at their fellow passengers? I try to keep my level of overt instability down to a shout when possible. So in addition to being the more discreet and portable option for sanity maintenance, Annie Lennox is more eloquent than I am in matters of emotional exposition. And Scottish, which also counts for a lot.

Last night, as I was shuffling along yet another street on another night, surfing another wave of familiar melancholy, "Cold" came up on the playlist, the one I specifically engineered for walks such as this. Not exactly the Walk of Shame, more the Dramatic Stride of Pretending This Is Your Montage Sequence. It is very cold and I am sick and I felt well entitled to my flagrant wallowing.

This playlist which has so often gloriously exacerbated my dark moods has its genesis in a mix CD that I first made during my last year of high school. At first it was one volume and then two. I wore it out, I had to remake it. Sometimes a few of the selections changed, most made the transition. When I got my first iPod - the one that weighed 4 lbs and only had 15 minutes of battery life on a good day - the first playlist I made was comprised of those songs I felt were in it for the long haul. It even kept the same title as it's predecessor.

Quite obviously, the main advantage of a playlist over the mixtapes of yore is that playlists are infinitely fluid, adaptable. You can add and delete at your leisure without sacrificing $20 worth of blank CDs. Your number of tracks is limitless. Gone are the limitations of physical media! Nevertheless, this was one playlist to which I gave strict guidelines. It would be serving a highly specialized purpose, as it had in its original incarnation. It was the Navy SEALs of playlists. I've added things to it, but only after careful consideration - "How much this really make me want to cry deep, wrenching sobs of despair?" In reality, though, the same songs that I painstakingly burned on that mix CD almost a decade ago have served me well all this time.

But last night a strange thing happened as I began my shuffle of impending montage. Instead of settling into the comforting sit bath of self-imposed depression, I had a startling jolt of clarity. I had walked down a different street on a different night, surfing a different wave of righteous self-pity over a different mess. I listen to this same playlist each time that I go screeching into the brick wall of reality and begin to think that my best option is to hurl myself in front of the M6 bus, hope that reincarnation is real, and start over again. Hopefully not as a spider monkey or an Arquette.

Last night, the playlist got a little fed up with me.

"Don't be a silly twat," said Annie Lennox in her dulcet tones. "This too shall pass."

I'm not going to mess with Annie Lennox. She hasn't done me wrong yet.

Things that happened, Part 2

... from Friday, October 23, 1998

Barbara called this afternoon around 3pm. I guess I was in lecture; I certainly wasn't home. She told my mother that she hadn't called sooner because she was having "family problems" (i.e. she's fighting with her mother again - like no one else does this) even though I would "probably think that's crap." She knows me too well. Apparently she wasn't having family problems last weekend when she went out with Alyssa and Colleen. Or when she called James on Monday. Jesus Christ, at least try and think of a decent excuse. I was mauled by wolves, for instance.

I wonder sometimes about these people I call my friends. But why dwell on it?

Today was probably the first I can remember in a long while where I didn't work on my film. I guess I decided to give myself a break after finishing the visual aspect of it. On Monday I need to get the voice over in there as soon as I can sneak into the multimedia lab.

It was an absolutely beautiful day. I think Fridays should always entail nice weather. There should be some kind of mandate. There's something about fresh, warm sunshine and a cloudless sky that makes you feel like that whole week was worth it. Because of that I think the painfully overcrowded subway (due to the victory parade for the Yankees) didn't make me as homicidal as it might have.

This is something I'm going to work at from now on. I'll do some existential housecleaning and try focusing on the positive things in my life. Dare I say that I'm giving optimism a chance? Maybe. You never know you don't like it until you try it.

On the other hand, since I seem to be doing pretty well in my liberal arts-centered classes, I can't help but think that I'm only kidding myself with this film major. As much as I kept telling everyone that, if it didn't work out, I wouldn't feel as though I failed - yeah, that's a lie. I could never admit that I had not only made a bad choice but that I was also unable to live with it. I have this thing about permanence. If I'm going to wrangle enough courage to do something drastic, it's going to damn well be a lasting arrangement. I could never see myself switching majors (much less changing schools - I did that enough in grammar school), getting a new job, admitting that I was wrong. If I make a bad choice, I'm going to stick with it. That's probably not a terribly productive way of thinking, but, hey - tenacity has got to be worth something, right?

Although, at the moment, I'm enjoying myself well enough in my film classes. Whether I like it enough to make a living at it is still up for debate. Maybe I'm trying to convince myself that I do just to save face. Nah. I wouldn't sit through my hellish Language of Film recitation on sheer principle alone.

The only other notable thing today was that I fainted during my blood test. I'm not at all ashamed of this. To the contrary, I seem to find these kinds of weak moments as possessing their own brand of glory. I'm not totally sure why it happened; I've had these sort of tests for more than five years and never had a problem. It's certainly not my favorite thing, but it's nothing worth passing out over. Regina, the nurse, asked me if it was "my first faint" (like when people talk about your first period or your first date - some kind of initiation into adulthood?). No, actually, it was my second faint. There was that little incident in the emergency room two years ago. I'm quite the veteran when it comes to unceremoniously collapsing after needles are involved. So Regina actually pronounced me "a fainter," brought me a Coke, and told me to have my blood taken lying down from now on. Oh, indeed, I sure will.

After that I went to McDonald's and ordered myself a Deluxe Big Breakfast. I'm such a medical hypocrite.

Just Saying: Tuesday Edition

I thought of this last night: When the people who bought my grandparents' house decide to landscape the backyard, I hope they're prepared for the assortment of dead pets they're going to find.

There are at least 3 cats, a skunk and a couple of hamsters. Although one of the cats had a headstone. Maybe that will tip them off.

Am I the only one who finds it a little strange that after you've had your pet put down, the vet actually gives it back to you in a shopping bag? Kind of a weak consolation prize, in the grand scheme of things.

Hopefully the new owners won't give us our cats back in a shopping bag after they finish putting in their pool. I'm sure they smell quite bad by now.

Dear eBay Customers:

First of all, I'd like to thank you for providing me with a fairly healthy source of extra income these last few years. I really appreciate it, since I doubt I would be able to fund my wine habit without you. However, some of you are really causing me to question whether you really ought to be a) using the Internet or b) committing any acts of retail whatsoever. So let's go over a few simple guidelines which will hopefully make any further transactions less irritating for me.

Stop asking me if the J. Crew skirt I was good enough to fully document with actual photos of the actual item with the actual tag attached is "authentic." Seriously, people. Please don't even tell me there exists a place to get knock-off J. Crew because that's just really sad. I know there's a place to buy knock-off Louis Vuitton, Chanel and (God help me) Juicy Couture - it's called Canal Street. I also know there's a place to buy knock-off Banana Republic - it's called The Gap. However, if there is a place where one can obtain J. Crue, I have no idea where that is - nor do I want to find out because I'm sure that it's a sign of the collapse of modern society. If you're really that concerned about the authenticity of your argyle sweaters or hideous horse-print satin skirts, I suggest you purchase them at full price from your local J. Crew retailer.

Another note on authenticity: the fact that you're getting on your moral high horse in the first place is a little laughable, no? I'm well aware that eBay perpetuates a culture whereby anyone who's selling anything is automatically assumed to be an unscrupulous child rapist who robs graves when not ripping off any wide-eyed innocent foolish enough to bid on his or her items. But let's be real and admit that both sides of the transaction are inherently shady. You buyers are certainly not without your own coating of sleaze. If it matters that much to you, just bid on those pants, then take them over to your nearest Club Monaco and ask a friendly salesperson to verify that they're genuine Club Monaco sweatshop product. Oh, right, because then you'd have to admit that you bought them off eBay in the first place, you stinking hypocrite. So shut up.

Hey. You see that section that says "shipping costs"? Cool, ok. You see where it says "Worldwide shipping cost: $15.00"? Right, right. I'm not sure if you're aware of this, but The World pretty much encompasses the whole planet. All of it. Not just the nice parts where we go on vacation. So that probably answers your question as to how much I charge to ship to Uzbekistan or Taiwan or wherever the hell you live that's not America without you having to email me, right? Oh. I guess not.

No, I don't have it in another size. Because I'm not one of those people who buys things in 4 different sizes with the intention of eventually getting started on that diet of organic swiss chard and Xantrex 3 so I can fit into them. And then selling them on eBay when I realize I'm still never going to be a size 6. Just because you do that doesn't mean I do.

Asking for the measurement of the waistband, cuff or other completely ludicrious part of the garment is only going to piss me off. I'm giving you all the measurements you need, folks. And, really, let's be frank: you know whether a size Large is going to fit you or not. So don't waste my time. I would say don't waste yours, but I don't think your time is all that valuable to begin with.

Be aware of what a cheap, nitpicking assclown you look like when you try to haggle over shipping. I'm only charging you $8.00 for overnight shipping within these United States, unlike most of my fellow sellers who will gouge you $25.00 to send your stuff via presorted standard mail. And I don't care if you'd rather me drop it off in an unmarked plastic bag next to the service entrance at Burger King so your mentally challenged brother can pick it up on his Razor scooter, or whatever other ridiculous "alternate method" of goods exchange you would prefer. Do you call up customer service at Victoria's Secret and try to negotiate with them or do you just happily bend over and pay $13.50 for them to mail you the ill-fitting bras you ordered? Yeah, that's what I thought.

Once we've completed a sale - I have my money, you have whatever piece of shit that I didn't want anymore - don't email me and ask me to leave you feedback. That pretty much ensures that I won't. Or, even less pleasant, I will leave negative feedback which states that you came to my house, stole the item, pistol-whipped my grandmother and pissed in my houseplants. So don't push it. Increasing your feedback rating isn't going to make you any less of a waste of space.

So I hope that going forward we can avoid these annoying little bumps in the road on our way to a successful transaction.

Oh, before I forget: I'd also like to send a special hello out to that lying bitch who bought two pairs of shoes, broke the heel off one of them, filed a bogus complaint with Pay Pal and ripped me off for $157. Don't forget that I have your home address.

Hi, I'm Paul Weller

Are you in a band? You might as well quit now.

No, I mean it. Just give it up, you're embarrassing yourself. I'm telling you this for your own good.

By the way, anyone got a fag?

The lost years

I'm missing one of my journals.

This is a little horrifying.

I've been trying to kid myself that I'd only misplaced it. But as I was on my hands and knees, reaching under the bed in a last ditch effort to convince myself that I was hiding it in my guitar case, reality finally came crashing down. Somewhere during the course of my last move, the written record of three years of my life has been lost to circumstance.

I probably wouldn't have even noticed had I not decided to take a trip down memory lane. Over the last week or so, I've been reading through all of my journals piecemeal, bits here and there throughout the years. After spending several nights revisiting countless unfortunate crushes, over dramatized school worries, and lots of transcribed song lyrics, I was more than a little over myself. But more than anything, I hadn't been able to glean the perspective that I'd hoped from analyzing my past self. I'm looking into those corrective lenses for hindsight that I keep hearing so much about. For every meaningful turn of phrase or happy memory that would have otherwise been forgotten, there was a noticeable cringing. Is it really such a good idea to keep these things? Not only saving the old ones but persisting in scrawling out book after book, year after year?

My motivations in keeping a journal have shifted over time. When I first felt the urge to have a diary, I was about 12. My parents' divorce was getting uglier by the minute, and what better way was there to immortalize your court-appointed therapy? I existed under the delusion that someone, someday might uncover it, like a lost Hemingway manuscript, and publish it. Considering that at that time I was chiefly concerned with Star Trek and collecting those furry animal stickers, it's probably for the best that my early work avoided commercial distribution. After high school, there was more of a focus on pure documentation - I recounted conversations verbatim, described events neutrally. Then I was writing out of habit, feeling that it was more an obligation than anything else. Aw, shit, I might as well write something since The X-Files is a repeat.

Then something changed. In the last few years, my journals got uglier, less structured. I found that the only time I felt the urge to write anything was when it was weak or self-hating or a fist shaken at the sky at the unfairness of things. It became an fetid swamp for me to unload all of the things that I worried would taint my real life with The Crazy. Rather than meticulously documenting events, it was a litany of heartbreak, neediness and open letters to people I despised for what I deemed casual cruelty. I go back and read things that concern me sometimes, pieces of thoughts that I know I've had before and swore that I wouldn't have again. On the other hand, it could be that personal progress isn't so much not having the thoughts as not indulging them by sobbing on the phone in a hotel room to someone who really didn't need to talk to you about this at 1:00AM on a Tuesday. Progress is keeping your crazy off the street.

If you tell a lie long enough, everyone around you will believe it. Contrary what people say, you yourself never do. It just gets less and less hard to tell. In making the effort to keep my less attractive impulses contained in blank books provided by Barnes & Noble, it's almost as though I've managed to spread a whitewash over all my scars. I know they're there, although I might kid myself otherwise. As a result, I've come to realize that I seem simple and well-adjusted. Overconfident, suggested someone who I thought knew me pretty well. I find it both funny and frustrating, I guess. Having been the unhappy misfit for so much of my life, it's strange to realize no one believes you can appreciate their damage.

And that's the thing. Damage is compelling and charismatic. For a long time, I always wore my dysfunction on my sleeve; I was unapologetic of its manifestations. What better way to make sure that everyone likes you because you're a hot mess with too much baggage? Fuck them if they can't deal with it! I'm a twitching bundle of emotional tics! It's the curse of the self-awareness. But after too many emails that should have never been sent, too many people alienated, too much time offered up to the seductive cult of self-pity, I was simply unwilling to work that hard. Being in love with your own pain gets tiresome. Get cable. Read a book. Mock others - most of them deserve it. By all means, be fucked up but temper it with a larger perspective. To borrow a phrase*, "Life is short, and then you die with a bad CD collection."

I'm trying not to mourn my missing journal too much. Those years are gone from the collection, so there's no opportunity to revisit the mistakes, poor word choices and probably not as many lessons as I might hope. Although, to be honest, this week I've been looking back on my past self with more generosity than I'll allow my current incarnation. Isn't that always the way?

Maybe the value is less in the actual record and more in the writing. And so it goes.

* Thanks, Mark

Smash! Hit!

A couple of people asked me if I've watched American Idol while it's still wallowing in its audition stage. Apparently there was a guy who sang several songs, spanning diverse genres, in the classical style of one, Brett Scallion. I'm sure it was painful and embarrassing for all parties involved, but no more so than your mom insisting on telling your friends that one joke about
the rabbi and the parakeet that she can't ever really remember. But that's at least a private shame. The point-and-look fascination that people have with this spectacle of the untalented year after year is a little beyond me.

Do they not have a karaoke bar in your town where you can witness this kind of thing first hand? Because let me tell you, after a few red devils at Tracy J's, coercing someone with an outrageously bad voice into singing isn't all that difficult. Not only will the previously reluctant decide that belting out "Sweet Child O' Mine" in that time-honored tuneless, shouty fashion is an excellent idea, but they "will totally kill it, dude." Certain people approach karaoke (often stumbling) with the unwavering confidence of the musically ignorant. More often than not, you have no idea how hard certain songs, not matter how hackneyed, are to sing until you try to do it even passably well - it took 12 takes and an act of God for me to even hit the correct notes on the first line of "Do They Know It's Christmas?"

Maybe I'm in an uniquely qualified position to appreciate this, but there's a lot of untalented people out there. Music is harder than it looks, my friends. Even thunderously average music requires a certain level of Neanderthal brilliance. (So easy even Chad Kroeger can do it!) It's not like just anyone can sit down and bang out a trite, derivative yet commercially viable radio hook. That kind of highly-valued mediocrity is created in labs from call-out research and survey groups and probably some kind of ancient voodoo ritual. Nevertheless there's a lot of average floating around - some halfway decent average, some bad average, some boring average. Some average that sells millions, some average that couldn't get its mom to come to a gig.

However.

When the needle slips below the very generous purgatory of the average or even of "not horrible," we enter the murky water of things that are bad. Lots of things are bad, but certain things are so overwhelming, spectacularly terrible that they take on a certain aura that can best be described as "Oh my fucking God - seriously?"

It takes a magical blend of sheer ineptitude and lack of shame to create what's I've come to be term The Smash Hit. Let's be clear: there's a razor thin line of difference between bad and awesomely bad. Often what sets the awesomely bad apart is the pure, clear-eyed belief in their talent. Come to think of it, this is probably the ultimate appeal of the American Idol train wrecks: being truly, blissfully unaware of how terrible you are really is a thing of beauty. Even in the face of cold hard reality, they persist. Even to the point of putting themselves on national television. Or, in my particular experience, asking to be signed to a major record label. My friends Rob, Kodi and Nick took it upon themselves, toiling mightily in the A&R department and slogging through the dirge known as "unsolicited submissions," to put together several compilations of Smash Hits. It became legendary in our office. We even held release parties of sorts, each one more eagerly anticipated than the last. Each Smash Hit had that sublime quality of not only being unequivocally bad but also hilariously unaware of how bad it really was. It was beautiful.

So if nothing else, maybe we should celebrate the American Idol auditions for keeping the well of potential Smash Hits deep and dark and full of fresh horrors. Because as long as there is someone out there willing to record an off-key cover of "The Rose" or actually pen the lyrics "Evelyn / You are very small / You hold the ball," there will always be a little bit of magic in this world.

Elucidate

How many $3 words have you used today?

Gay boyfriend!

I was on my way back from the post office this afternoon - not my favorite place, but I needed to mail something, and they do a better job than me throwing it out the window and hoping for the best - when I thought to myself, "That looks like Ted Allen." Oh, that's because it is Ted Allen. Squee!

Probably because he practices a decidedly low-level brand of faggotry and a high level of withering disdain, I used to have a delightful crush on Ted Allen. And there he was on the corner of 23rd St and 7th Ave - right in front of the hot dog place. Make of that what you will.

This was sort of funny, only in that I had seen Clinton Kelly on the 1 train on my way to work a few months ago. I also adore Clinton Kelly, despite the fact that the American version of "What Not To Wear" is a crime against popular culture. And, really, it's just wrong because that man is something like 6'4" and looks as though could bench press me. Must you mock me, fates? Wither the tremendously sturdy straight men?

Although, to be honest, neither Clinton nor Ted can be my true gay boyfriend - my heart already belongs to Andrew, the manager of my local Chipotle. He is faaabulous and gives me free burritos, evidently just for showing up. Unless he thinks I'm packing something that I'm not, and that would be highly embarrassing for both of us.

Johnnie and Ella

If you ever have one of those nights where you decide the best thing you can do is snuggle up with some jazz and a bottle of scotch (the whole bottle), let me elaborate on the necessary precautions that you should take:

• Turn off your cell phone: people that you haven't spoken to in five years will not call you back. They don't even remember who you are. Or, if they do, they will not accept the charges.
• You will sing: loudly and enough to annoy the gay guys next door, despite the fact that it's basically payback since you've had to listen to more than your share of Kylie Minogue at high volumes. But be aware that you're not in the key you think you are. And that song is harder to sing than you think it is. But go on, girlfriend.
• Make the drinks stronger: who cares if the soda is flat? And don't worry about how late the deli across the street is open. Drinking it straight will seem less unsavory in a little while, trust me.
• Pretend: go ahead and think you're tragically romantic. You are drunk by yourself and cursing iTunes because they don't have the painfully sad, live version of "One More For My Baby" that you wanted. Just listen to something by AC/DC and get over yourself.

And the important thing to remember is that tomorrow? Yeah. It's going to hurt.

MTV Quote of the Day

"If I've learned anything, it's that girls only like fat guys who lie!"

No, we like fat guys who beat us too.

Necessary objects

There's not a lot of solid reasoning in the the kinds of things that I decide to hold on to, nor is there much organization involved. Things are stashed in drawers or boxes without much foresight as to whether I might eventually need to find them again. Not unlike the time that we accidentally closed up one of the cats in the sofa bed. Or maybe not like that at all, but anyway, fun with pets. As a matter of fact, I just opened my desk drawer and found not only the picture of myself in 7th grade that I had been looking for but also the pair of free socks that Virgin Atlantic gifted me on my flight three years ago. Point proven. And these are ugly socks.

When I was growing up, our house was fairly large with a basement and two storage rooms in the attic. Three, if you count my bedroom. Since we had the space, there was a tendency to keep stuff. I can't even say that it was because we are a highly sentimental family - "Oh, we simply can't throw away great-grandma's corrective shoes! It's like she's still here with us!" - since, really, we're not. There was a much larger air of pragmatism about the whole thing. Just because, well, you never know when you might need an adult-size pumpkin costume. Or the large, dead moth in a frame - this actually used to hang on the wall outside my room and the minute I found out that it was not made of feathers but had once indeed been a living, flying moth, it was banished. We kept things because, even though we might know in our heart of hearts that they were useless or inconvenient, we might need them someday.

In this grand tradition of practicality, I find myself downsizing how much stuff I have every time I move. One of the stone-cold facts about living in New York City is that you simply can't possess much more than the absolute bare minimum of shit. If you have two kids, you'll need to decide which of them you like more. This is the trade-off you make for living in the most glorious terrorist target on Earth. My last apartment was the approximate size of a handicapped bathroom stall, which meant that I had to make a lot of tough choices (for the curious, the framed moth didn't make the cut). In order to maximize space, I bought a trunk which I could use as a coffee table as well as storage for things that I felt like I needed to keep, except not in plain view of strangers. Just because, you know, they might come in handy. We'll visit the dubious logic of what those things were in a minute.

Although my current apartment is considerably larger, there are still plenty of storage issues, and I strongly suspect the layout was designed by people who don't own anything. As a result, we have our DVDs in the kitchen, the power tools under the sink, and my Calphalon skillet lives full-time in the broiler. You do what you gotta do. And often what you gotta do is get rid of something anytime that you buy something else.

Since I got home from visiting Mom for Christmas, I'm left with the thorny issue of what exactly to do with the four boxes of new stuff I ended up with. I spent a full minute seriously considering whether I could put the electric grill on top of the entertainment center and pass it off as modern art. I already had to beg her not to give me any more dish towels before they stage a revolution and secede the kitchen from the rest of the apartment. Unless I threw out my ironing board and two pairs of cowboy boots, I was going to have to put some more stuff in the trunk.

The trunk. What in the hell do I keep in there anyway? Ostensibly it's a weird kind of hope chest where I put things of value to be treasured by future generations. In addition to 15 years worth of journals and my clean bedding, I also found the following items in the trunk:

• miso soup bowl and spoon
• 8th grade salutatorian award plaque
• dice
• VHS tape of my 1st year film projects
• sheriff badge with the name "Wayne"

I just put the Virgin Atlantic socks back in there as well - I might need them.

Things that happened, Part 1

...from Saturday: September 16, 2000

Trish and I were sitting in Dojo's at about 10pm last night. She glanced at me over her plate of yakisoba. "Are you OK?" she said.

"No," I said, smiling back. "I'm freaking out." I took a deep breath. "You know what it is? If we get there and his girlfriend isn't there, I'll be fine. That's what's making me crazy right now, not knowing."

We got the check, left and started the walk to Bleeker St. It was cold out, and I shivered under my sweater. When we got to the corner before the club, the thought that maybe we wouldn't find him at all in the horde of people (the band that was playing at that particular moment seemed to have a pretty large following) vaguely crossed my mind. "I take it back," I thought frantically, "I don't want to see him at all. I want to go home."

I felt like the guy manning the door at the club ought to remember us, but I said, "I'm on the list," pointing to my name.

"What's your name?" he hollered at me.

I told him.

I didn't even go through the entrance before I was faced with him. His buzz cut had grown out into a crop, and I realized that he really was completely gray. It looked like he hadn't shaved in a few days.

"Hey!" he beamed before I even had a chance to process what was happening.

From behind me, I heard Trish saying "Must he him."

I turned. "Yeah. Must be."

Sitting in the corner by the door was his friend Darren with my CDs and assorted other things I haven't even looked at yet. The fact that he himself was pretty much staying by the bar and not with Darren suddenly set off an alarm in my head. He didn't... He wouldn't and not tell me... There were so many people around that it was hard to get a sense of what was going on. I turned and said something to Darren, and when I looked back, I saw him sitting next to a dark-haired woman in her 30s. His girlfriend.

A wash of hollowness ran through me. I felt totally numb. "I'll be right back," I said to Trish. "I'm going to put the CDs in the car."

She stared at me. "You're going back to the car? By yourself?"

"Yeah, I'll be fine." And I stepped outside into the air. The entire episode had taken maybe three minutes.

During the fifteen minute walk to the car and back, I kept waiting for the surge of emotion to hit me. I didn't know what it was going to be - anger, depression, embarrassment - but I figured that something had to come. But by the time I got back inside, nothing had. I still felt that horrible deadness.

As Trish and I made our way past the bar towards the stage, I got as good a look at his girlfriend as I could without calling attention to myself. She's in her mid-30s, rather plain-looking, much thinner and shorter than me. She didn't really look or seem all that impressive, and she was wearing possibly the ugliest floral pants in the tri-state area. The oddness of not knowing her name really hit me, and I looked away before I got caught gawking.

We ended up getting a table right next to the left side of the stage. Darren came and sat down next to me. I think he sensed that I was not happy for some reason, and I felt badly since he has no idea what's going on. He's a nice guy, I like him. Thank God for him making me laugh during the night or I really would have been a mess. Halfway through the set of the band that was currently onstage, Darren leaned in and said, "Let me tell my boy you guys got a table. His girlfriend would love to sit up front. Is that cool?"

Under the table, Trish squeezed my hand.

"Yeah, that's fine," I said weakly.

"Cool!" Darren grabbed his beer and got up. "I'll go tell them, I'll be right back."

As soon as he walked away, I turned to Trish and said only half-jokingly, "If there is a God, they will stay at the bar."

They stayed at the bar. A few times, he walked past us to go to the back where the band he worked for was waiting to go on. I didn't talk to him - there was nothing I could think of to say. I barely even looked at him. At one point he stopped to say something to Darren, and as he walked past me, I suddenly felt a sting in the middle of my back.

"He just hit me, didn't he?" I said to Trish.

She nodded. "Well, you gave him a look."

I had flinched when he flicked at my back, but I didn't turn or otherwise respond. It was also apparent that every time he came past our table, he did so alone. I'm not sure what the deal was - he thought I would act out or he didn't trust himself, whatever. But he never came near me with his girlfriend.

The band we were there to see did an OK set. It was late, the place was only 3/4 full. The crowd reaction was pretty mediocre. I got as good a video as I could considering that I couldn't use the tripod and had to shoot the whole thing handheld. After the set was over, Darren wandered off to talk to the band, and Trish decided to go to the bathroom. I was alone at the table, and this is the moment I regret the most. It was the make-or-break 30 seconds of the evening, and I managed to shatter everything.

I was fairly intoxicated at this point (damn that drink minimum), and I was staring off at nothing in particular when I felt a nudge on my arm. I looked up, and he was standing over me. He waved in the general direction of the camera, which was sitting on the table. "Good footage?" he said, his voice a little tense.

I nodded imperceptibly. I just stared at him. He was wearing the same kind of outfit he had the last time I'd seen him: jeans and a t-shirt and an open button-front shirt over that. He seemed much taller when I was sitting down. His eyes really are very blue. The short hair suited him. He looked good.

"He's an attractive man," Trish had shrugged earlier.

"You really think so?" I had said, relieved.

"Yeah, he's good-looking."

But as I looked up at him, I wasn't thinking that he was a good-looking man or even that I thought I loved him - my mind was blank. I felt so much that my heart couldn't bear it and just stopped feeling everything. I guess my face had automatically slid into that calculated expression of angry hurt that I hadn't really used in quite some time.

"What's the look for?" he said, sounding irritated and uncomfortable.

My expression didn't change. I shrugged ever so slightly and turned my attention back to my drink.

He walked away and didn't come near me again for the rest of the night. But I watched him - it wasn't that hard, the place had pretty much emptied out at that point. Maybe it's wishful thinking, but there didn't seem to be an especially affectionate dynamic between him and his girlfriend. They didn't touch each other or even stand all that close together. Trish mentioned that his girlfriend seemed disinterested and sour-looking the entire night.

We cashed out our tab and decided to go home. Darren, who seemed painfully confused by what was going on, said haltingly, "Uh, well, my ride's leaving. I gotta go." By the time we paid our check and got outside, the three of them were already gone. It was over.

Mercifully, I was pretty fucked up at that point and managed to stumble to Trish's car, raving the entire way and swinging the tripod dramatically for emphasis. She laughed at me, and I laughed at myself. I was glad I was drunk because I didn't cry. I didn't want to cry.

When I got back to my apartment, I drank a wine cooler and waited to see if I was going to be subject to a great rush of bitter tears and hysteria. Nothing came. I took off my clothes and went to bed for six hours of restless sleep. It was over.

I never did cry over it. Not even the next day after I had sobered up. I guess there really is nothing left to cry about.

Welcome to the holiday season!

The bars are wide open, and - half a bottle of Dewar's into the evening - I almost tackled a very slight woman in a bowtie for some cold meat on a cracker.

What can I say: I like living on the razor's edge of personal and professional humiliation.

When A Woman Doesn't Want You

Oh, Gary Lightbody. It's true. You have so much working against you: you're saddled with a visage that's best described as the goofier Zach Braff. No one can really tell where in the hell you're actually from- NotQuiteEnglandistan? You're a bit of tweaker onstage. VH1 is going to make all of us want to commit suicide rather than hear "Chasing Cars" one more time, which is a shame.

And yet. There is also much to love. Remember a few years ago, at the Bowery Ballroom, when you told that very cute story about shopping for sneakers? The crowd banter at the 9:30 Club? So charming. You can actually sing your songs live. You write delightfully endearing updates on your blog. You are tall! Which is why I've yet to understand your painfully intense crush on Martha Wainwright.

Not only did you write this song specifically so she could sing on it, but we have to suffer through your panting, boot-kissing introduction of her every time you perform it live. Maybe it's me - she never seems to be that excited to be there. I'm just saying. But fair enough, let's have at this before you turn into a puddle of puppy love right here and now.

And then it comes (at 2:05 for those playing along at home): Martha busts out The Sprinkler. If you missed it - which, really, you can't miss something as completely ludicrous as The Sprinkler - she does it again. Quite enthusiastically, I might add.

Gary. Seriously. I don't always agree with people's romantic choices - I mean, shit, I generally don't agree with my own - but The Sprinkler? Nothing about this song calls for this sort of behavior. This is a sad, sad, sad love song about a bond struggling to survive 16-months of touring. The "Faithfully" of its time, if you will. Loving a music man is not always what it's supposed to be! And Martha goes and mocks it with her spastic Hunch of Indie Cred.

This is not the woman for you, Gary, no matter how much you want it to be so. I'm telling you this for your own good. You can shove her in a gear case (I'm sure she fits) and trot her out at every stop for as long as you want, but she will never love you. Let her go. Call me.

Resistance is futile

There came a point in my life where I made the decision against subscribing to a regular schedule of prime time network TV; I chose the path of catch as catch can with my entertainment. It's pretty liberating, and yet there are occasional repercussions. One of these is that I became frighteningly well versed in the extensive catalogue of rare genetic diseases via the Discovery Health Channel. Another is that I found myself watching the Country Music Awards.

Much about the culture of country music confuses me. On one hand, it's painstakingly manufactured right down to those fabulous bedazzled blazers, and yet it's probably the one genre of popular music where you're really forced to sing live. This was probably the thing that impressed me most about the performances at the CMAs - the mix was utterly horrendous, but everyone with a microphone was definitely holding it down in the real. Most times to their detriment. Yes, we're looking at you, Martina McBride. I guess when really the only thing you're bringing to the table is a passable singing ability, you might as well have to actually do it. Country music singers are generally a single threat. This goes without saying: those people cannot dance - all boot-scootin' aside. Their very sense of rhythm is often questionable. And you really don't have to be terribly attractive either, although as with most professional whoring, it helps. All of this is doubly-true for men (we're looking at you, Big & Rich), since country music likes its fellas hearty and overwhelmingly male. Not a lot of dancing there, THANK GOD, just a lot of standing (perhaps some walking) and looking deeply earnest about...something. His lady. His truck. Fishing. The whole thing is alien and off-putting, and yet. I can't look away.

Let me first admit: I'm half genuine Irish redneck. I have been to a dirt-track race and eaten unshelled peanuts out of a plastic bag. I know what a fish camp is. None of my cowboy boots are from Urban Outfitters. My daddy owns a very large pick-up truck and a lot of NASCAR caps. I am not fronting, my friends.

As it turned out, Dad was solely responsible for my musical taste until I was about 13, so I listened to both kinds: country and western. But he was kind of a purist in that regard - Randy Travis and Alabama were OK, but Leann Rimes was a harpy. I didn't question this. Actually one of my favorite songs used to be "If The South Woulda Won" by Hank Williams Jr.

I'd make my Supreme Court down in Texas,

And we wouldn't have no killers gettin’off free.

If they were proven guilty, then they would swing quickly,

Instead of writin’ books and smilin’ on T.V.

It was very much the "America, Fuck Yeah" of it's time. Why Hank never ran for political office as opposed to becoming Kid Rock's towel boy is beyond me, really.

Regardless of what may have happened in my formative years, in practice I'm squarely a big stinking Yankee. I do not know my way around any weaponry, which is a major blow to my redneck cred. I abhor Budweiser products. Until very recently the concept of pulled meat was unappealing and vaguely frightening. I don't have any friends named Skillet. But none of this was really a problem. Until.

My equally Yankee, New York-bred mother moved to a suburb of Nashville. After about a year of bemoaning the withdrawal from normal pizza and Macy's, something disturbing happened. She admitted to not only knowing who Keith Urban was but liking the Sugarland album. These things always start small. When I came down to visit, she strongarmed me into a walking tour of the Country Music Hall of Fame (for the concerned: the stage costumes of both Judds are being well-preserved for posterity). I'm not sure what I did to deserve any of this besides show up. However, the assimilation is officially complete at this point: any time I call Mom's cell phone, I'm treated to Larry The Cable Guy telling me he's going to git'er done. All hope is lost.

So I'm a little concerned. This is much more serious than the high cholesterol, the other thing my genetics were kind enough to gift me. Country music will eat your soul. Any day now I expect to be shopping out of the Shepler's catalogue and naming my children Walker and Texas Ranger.