Chapter 3 – Nobody knows what they miss
I’ve been told the reason children enjoy the kinds of stories they do is because of the secrets they hold. Kids love to think they know something their parents or friends don’t. They love secrets. The entire Narnia, Harry Potter, and Lord of the Rings series’ are based on the idea of children holding secrets. Like most things in life, we’d like to think this changes as we get older. But it doesn’t. Especially if you like music.
Ted Leo is awesome. I saw him live last night. Like all amazing artists, his live show breaks to pieces his recorded material (something I’ve always found adequate but never groundbreaking). He sings fireball love and protest songs, and you wouldn’t believe so much sound comes out of a three person band. I’m so glad I went. It put me up in a position of being happy, something I haven’t felt in a while. Come to think about it, I’m pretty sure my general happiness is directly proportionate to when I see rock concerts.
But during the day, I wasn’t excited about this at all. I was at the high school I volunteer at during most of the day, and I had to explain to everyone why I couldn’t come to the parent/teacher conference thing happening at night. I told them I had tickets for a rock show, and when I told them this, everyone got excited. They asked who it was, and I said “Ted Leo,” and everyone, literally everyone I talked to, gave me a look of either disappointment or disgust. At first I thought “What the hell is so wrong with Ted Leo?” But I soon realized that there was something very wrong with Ted Leo; nobody knew who he was.
If I had had this conversation on campus with people, I wouldn’t have received this sort of reaction. If nobody knew who Ted Leo was, they would tell me. Some would ask to hear something by him, others wouldn’t give a shit. The point is, nobody would be hurt in the way all these teachers seemed hurt. In a professional setting like this, where everyone has the same job, everyone basically is living the same life. All through lunch hour people talked about their jobs, the faults of the government, and CSI. More or less, everyone in that room lived the same life. And here I come in, with concert tickets to a show that nobody has heard of.
The weird thing is, Ted Leo is just about the most agreeable style of music out there. It’s essentially power pop. There’s nothing difficult about the music at all. It’s got a very upbeat, high energy that just brings a f*cking smile to your face, you know? It’s not like I’m talking about GWAR or anything. Given a chance, anyone can like Ted Leo. He’s got lyrical styles similar to the New Pornographers and the Gin Blossoms, guitar work that sounds like a mix between AC/DC and The Pixies, and a 100 pound bass player with a giant indie-fro. There’s nothing to not like (unless you’re the type who likes GWAR, then you could complain that Ted Leo doesn’t spout blood out of the top of his head).
More and more though, I’ve begun to realize that liking something has absolutely nothing to do with anything, especially in a professional setting where everyone is on the same watch. I don’t have to watch Survivor to be part of the conversation at school because just about nobody I know watches it. At this high school though, in the English office, there was a conversation about Survivor that went almost as long as the show itself, and that would be fine if it seemed like anyone actually enjoyed it. The thing is, nobody enjoyed it. The entire conversation was about how much they disliked certain characters, how the game seemed even more factitious this time around, and how hair simply doesn’t stay that shiny after camping for a week. To me, this makes absolutely no sense whatsoever. But then it hits me; I don’t think like this because I’m not “one of them.”
I have never met a single person with identical tastes to mine. Sure, you could say that about anyone anywhere, but I mean at least in terms of what really matters in life; music, movies, television, and books. I don’t know a single person who comes even close to what I like. That’s because I don’t fit into the two categories of pop culture addicts. The first kind are like those teachers I’m talking about. They’re the kind who will watch what everyone else is watching, whether it’s enjoyable or not. They take the good with the bad, and they do it basically so they can have something to talk about with the people around them.
The second group are the sort you might find lurking around Inside Pulse, the type who know what they like and follow it to the end. They’re the kind of folk who just stormed to the theaters to see Serenity, and they did this because they believed that Firefly is still the best series of the new Millennium, and who will hate the Fox network for the rest of their lives for cancelling it. They’re the type of folk who will watch what they like, but then actively search for like-minded people (usually on the internet) who proceed to then, during their lunch hours, talk about all the aspects of the show that they dislike.
Basically, everyone’s the same, even if they watch TV slightly differently.
But then there’s me, and I assume because I’m singling myself out there has to be a bunch of other people like me who might fit into a third category. I’m (we’re) the kind of people who watch what we like to watch regardless of the opinion of people I (we) know, regardless of popular opinion, and often regardless of my (our) own opinion. I guess we could be called ‘casual’ viewers, who generally stick to things we enjoy but never pursue them with great vigor. I’ve never been able to keep a schedule for television. I love Family Guy and The Daily Show and professional wrestling, but I’ll sometimes go weeks without seeing any of them. Unlike the first group, I’m not addicted to the social aspects of pop culture, and unlike the second, I’m not addicted to the, er, addictive qualities of pop culture. I suppose you could say that I could actually stop anytime I wanted to.
As well, there’s one very important aspect of pop culture that does absolutely nothing for me, and that’s hype. I don’t know what it is, but I’ve been lucky enough to break free of whatever it is that keeps most people glued to their televisions. I’m as shocked as anyone, really, because I can remember being 16 and so happy Squaresoft was coming out with Final Fantasy 9 because it was going back to the roots of the series and getting rid of all the crap 7 and 8 had going for them. I was excited because the hype told me to be excited. I bought the game and absolutely hated it. I had completely forgotten that not only had I never really played the first 6 Final Fantasies to any great extent, but I really enjoyed 7 and 8, and I missed all the cool stuff that was in them.
I’m betting someone on the internet will make a scoffing remark about my opinion on this one, because I know that 7 and 8 were pretty well panned by the hardcore fanbase, but if you’re scoffing at me then you’re not only way too late for it (those two games were released eight f*cking years ago, for one) but you’re also missing my point. It’s far too easy to make the opinion they hype wants you to have be the opinion you have. And I feel so relieved that I don’t feel that way about things anymore (except sometimes with girls).
And this is how it’s possible for me to like Ted Leo. For whatever reason, he’s off the radar of both the mainstream and indie press, even though he’s been around for a while and has a couple of records and never really does anything that either establishment would have a problem with. Ted is completely hype-free from all angles, and only people who are immune to hype can find these sort of things.
Of course, I find myself in a bit of a philosophical tangle here. This entire chapter has more or less ignored the main narrative of me trying to figure out my list of recent rejections and focused almost entirely on deconstructing why people like the things they do. In effect, I’ve been talking about why I like Ted Leo and why other people don’t have a damn clue who he is. Well, now that this chapter is out there, anyone who reads it knows the name of Ted Leo. And when you’re reading your local independent magazine that has concert dates of all the little bars in town, one of them will have his name in black print and you’ll pencil that down on Thursday night right after your dinner with Clair. Both will go well if you don’t tell that stupid joke about the Rabbi and the duck. And at that point, you will know both Ted Leo’s name and his amazing music. And my childhood love of keeping secrets will be ruined, because I’ve lost one.
But what’s the fun in secrets if they don’t eventually slip?
