A Funny Thing Happened To Me On The Way To The Local Record Store

Admittedly, I don't buy a lot of CDs anymore.  I used to, back before I could, well, press a button and in three minutes I'd own a cd.  I remember going to this dingy old record store (*edit* The Powerstation, thanks to Cody Rutter)  in my hometown of Whitewater, WI, which sadly I know doesn't exist anymore.  This owner, who looked like Dimebag Darrell on quaaludes, was in there with his giant dog (a requisite to own an independent record store, I assume) and I'd finger through the albums.  My first Metallica CDs were purchased there including  Kill 'em All, Metallica's first.  (The title of the album was an off-hand indictment of the record company who refused to use the snappier original title 'Metal Up Your Ass').  It's a no-remorse, galloping speed freak of an album, and certainly a far cry from what Metallica would become, what with the haircuts, the Napster debacle, the 'Re-Load', the live album with a symphony, and a litany of other inexcusable offenses to their fans (e.g. most words that have ever come out of Lars Ulrich's mouth).  Not a single metal-head in '83 could presage that bullshit. 

SO.   It would please me for you to imagine my excitement when I actually go a record store now.   I love the feeling, even though I come off like a poser.  I'm sniffed out instantly by not only dogs but the staff.  Any offhand comment about the not-so-recent Pavement reunion or J. Mascis' hair or how underwhelming the new Apples In Stereo album was is always met with minimum interest and maximum boredom.  My clothes are too thought out, my attitude anxious and not at all nonchalant.  I am an imposter.

SO. In all the post-coital glow and infatuation of seeing Foxy Shazam live the other week, I spent my hour break from work rushing across town to Shake-It Records for to purchase their new CD.  I had called Monday to ask if they had it in stock, just to be sure my deliberate circumventing of usual music acquisition methods were all for not not.  They guy who answered gave a confusing response, something about a "shipping order" and "released tomorrow but we don't have an order placed".  He put the phone down, talked to some other guys at the shop, and but then he said, "I assure you we'll probably have it in this week." 

SO. I'm in the store, looking at the new releases behind the counter.  When you go to any store looking for a certain item, there's an invisible halo that appears around it upon sighting, like those pencil-thin gold nimbi around saints in Italian Renaissance paintings.  I did not see that halo. 

'You guys got that new Foxy Shazam album in?’  Very casual but very weighted, like a suspicious boyfriend asking his girlfriend who that last text was from.

'Naw, we don't have it.  They have an exclusive arrangement with Hot Topic, and the record is only available there.'

I breathed and winced.

'Really? You're kidding me.'

'Nope.  Hot Topic.'

Hot Topic is the nadir of fashion, music, cultural aesthetic, and the apex of a commercialized cross-section of youth culture that, agreeably, we should attach an atomic bomb to and salute it off this plane of existence.  This mall-ready pre-fab shit-stain of a store feeds the pop-goth crowd morsels of tacky garbage too chintzy and and cringe-worthy to even be looked at ironically (e.g. spiked accessories, neon piercing insertions, graphic tees with Spongebob or Thrice (or quite possibly both) on them, still more trucker hats, etc...) 

SO.  This band that got its start in Cincinnati due in no small part to the local papers, local fans, and local record stores has now turned a cold shoulder to its roots in favor of a marketing strategy suited for the scientific opposite of at the very least my and record store guy's ethos.   It was no small stroke of bathos,  I’ll tell you that much, dear reader. 


Now,  I’m sure this is the workings of their record contract with The WB.  Metallica would have had some choice words to say about Warner Brothers.  Well, they would have until they sold-out too.  I usually don’t bandy that phrase about, the old cliche "sold-out",  because it’s often a too too toxic phrase that serves as an easy dismissal for an artist changing their sound, or exploring the gilded streets of pop music, or, indeed, signing to a major label. **(see footnote below).   But I use it with no small amount of reservation here.  This band sold directly out, and coming from someone who just recently fell in love with the band, to liking the fact that they were local, to seeing a thrilling live show, to actually wanting to go out and buy a record, to then realize that they sold their exclusive CD rights to Hot @(*&# Topic?  Its use is warranted. 


Usually when an indie band sells out you have time to reflect on their journey, their damn-the-man style or raw sound or their pluck and perseverance at getting “this far” and after you've come to the sad realization that they've succumbed to the machine they've raged so hard against, you hold up a framed photograph of the band from the hay day(sepia tone preferred) and dramatically turn it over on your bureau.  I barely had time to tell three people about this band before I realized they were no longer a part of an aesthetic that I enjoyed.  I look inward,  then, and wonder if I’m so immersed in the idea of acts staying plucky and independent that I can’t abide bands that all of a sudden grow to a point where they’re catching all the sun and casting a shadow over their former peers.

There was a great feature over a Pitchfork a month ago that really struck me.  It compared Lady Gaga and Joanna Newsom (!) and the way we view both acts.  I recommend reading the whole thing if that’s up your alley, but here’s a quote:

So whenever I hear complaints about new indie acts being predictable, bland, overly tasteful, or unambitious, I can't help thinking this might be part of the reason: That this scene may have started producing music the way some adolescents get dressed, corrosively self-conscious about any sign of unfashionable difference that opens them up to be mocked. At worst, you can wind up with a whole genre where the acts and the audience are both armoring themselves against standing out or embracing risks. You wind up reaching that weird provincial point where you're always cutting down the plant that grows higher than the others-- where the way you call for the music to be more interesting (or try to express what makes you more interesting) actually has the effect of making it tamer, less interesting.

Allow me to corrupt that metaphor a bit. 
SO.  Am I cutting down the good plant Foxy Shazam?  Yes.  Absolutely, the same way sports fans cut down Barry Bonds.  FZ mainlined steroids, booted up with a record deal, and all of a sudden is performing way out of its league.  It’s fun to watch Foxy Shazam go yard on every song of their new album, but inside I know I’m rooting for the drug that got them there.  Kill ‘em All, indeed.

Jeremy Larson, amateur writer and actor, searched around the store for another CD and instead bought a book. Feeling betrayed and bemused, he then went home, and purchased the new Foxy Shazam album from iTunes, wrote this write up, and is currently planning on taking a fishing trip to Lake Tahoe.   

**Lars Ulrich once said of Metallica, "Of course we sold-out.  We sold out every show on our tour."  One of many shreds of evidence to back up my aforementioned claim about Mr. Ulrich.