Twilight

Source: redmudnessa.tumblr.com via Brittany on Pinterest

I would like, if you'll allow, to reclaim the word "twilight." While it was once a beautiful vision of dusk in summer, fireflies and green leaves, the sky tinged pink over the lake -- this once lovely word has been stolen by glittery vampires that enjoy teasing preteen girls. You can see why I'm upset.

I went for a run with my roommate tonight. We left at 7:30pm and ran to Lake Shore Drive, and the skyline came around a corner, and we ran in awe of Chicago, watching the lights glitter on Navy Pier, competing with the Hancock and Sears* Towers for attention. On the way back north we were treated to a sunset over the classy Lakeview architecture. The air felt clear, clean, accommodating. This is twilight.

When I was a kid I would visit my grandparents in the Iowa countryside on a weekly basis. They lived, still live, next to a man-made pond where a family of swans lived in the summertime. We'd play croquet, or go swimming in the pool, or wander around the weeds in between the pond and the corn fields. (Like I said: Iowa.) At night we'd eat dinner on the porch. Dinner included a meat, a potato, a corn on the cob with butter, some fruit, and a glass of milk. We'd eat delicious Midwest dinner and watch the sun set over the little pond with the swans. There were fireflies, and they flitted in the half-lit air. That was twilight.

I say we take it back from these teenage vampire books that have something to do with Mormonism or werewolves or not showing the juicy parts of sex scenes or what have you. We take it back from them and give it to dusk in the summer, to air heavy with sweet scents, to surviving on barbequed meat and watermelon, to playing hard and being lazy. Because that sounds much more likely to get you laid.

* I will never call it the Willis Tower. That's bullshit. It's the Sears Tower. Why do I feel so strongly about this?

Twenty-somethings: Choosing a Lifestyle

So many lifestyle choices, so little time.

A quotation from New York Times columnist David Brooks as the commencement speaker for the Brandeis University 2011 graduating class:

"If you are like most college grads, you will spend the next decade of your lives moving from city to city, school to school and from job to job experimenting with different careers and lifestyles," he said. "While you do this, by the way, your parents will slowly go crazy. Everything will be contingent and uncertain."

As Brooks adeptly points out, our generation -- that is, the people born basically in the 80's and now spanning the powerful 21 to 31 demographic -- is behaving differently. Part of it is a necessary reaction to the economy and the job market; we must be willing to move for jobs. We become transient. I, who was raised by transients who wandered a full 3,000 miles from their birthplace, have resolutely made myself a home in Chicago. I extol its wonders -- lovely parks, Midwest attitude, North Ave Whole Foods -- while continually discovering new joys (Lake Shore Drive running path) and setbacks (pee smell that permeates the loop in the summer). It's a big city and I'm young/hyperactive and I like it here.

I know in my heart I probably won't stay in Chicago forever. There's too much of the world to see. I may leave for a few years and then return for good -- I'd like that, actually -- but I belong to the generational mindset that home is where I charge my cell phone. It's that attitude that has allowed my peers and classmates to fling themselves around the world -- Amsterdam, London, the Ukraine, not to mention Atlanta and LA and Portland and so forth. This, our twenties, is the time for adventure and experimentation.

With my location settled for now, and as I hazily hobble toward some sort of career path as a grad student, Brooks would probably agree that I can focus on experimenting with lifestyles. It's like trying on costumes. Do I want to be a jock or a bookworm? Should I spend my lunch hour socializing or exercising? What statement does my hairstyle make? In what clubs and boards and music ensembles will my time investment be worthwhile? Is there a job I'd want where a tribal neck tattoo would be inappropriate; and if so, how about an eagle and the U.S. flag emblazoned across my back? These, I submit, are the important lifestyle decisions of the typical (that is to say, self-absorbed American) twenty-something: It's about how you spend your time and what image you're projecting to the world and how true a snapshot that is of who you really are. It's why we're all so obsessed with Facebook and Twitter; social media is another foundation for building and maintaining a reputation. It's like being in high school again, but with slightly less naïveté and hopefully better hair.

Why not?

This year I have two cousins graduating from high school, five siblings graduating from various elementary-age grades (my twin brothers just finished kindergarten!), and a handful of friends finishing up Bachelor's and Master's degrees. Meanwhile even more of us are still trudging along, sorting through term papers and auditions and manuscripts, the terminal diploma months or years or decades away.

But the toil is the equivalent of the journey, especially if that journey (studying writing) has no set destination ("writing the great American novel" is so twentieth century). So all there is left to do is apologize to our parents, promise them we're happy and well-adjusted and thriving no matter what lifestyle we're attempting this week, and ask them to pretty please mail just one more check. Last one, I promise.

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P.S. Completely unrelated, but you should check out my side-project with my buddy Kevin Rinz titled New Age Whitman. The summer blog/Twitter (@NewAgeWhitman) will culminate in a raucous drinking event in August. I'm really excited for the power trip that is ordering interns to reconstruct the eastern seaboard using empty Bud light cans. Follow along in the fun!

Proper Usage: The Lava Story

A few years ago my mom and my sister were walking over a lava field. (I really need to think of a joke for that opener.) They were picking their way toward a glowing river of magma when my sister ran ahead. Now if you’ve never walked on lava, imagine the surface of the moon, but made of the food remains that get stuck on cookware if you leave them out without soaking them and then it’s IMPOSSIBLE to get off and so you try to put it in the dishwasher but that doesn’t work so it ends up sitting on the counter until your roommate gets annoyed enough to just WASH IT ALREADY. That stuff: crumbly, rough, jagged, and a ruiner of civil relationships.

So my four-year-old sister was running in the dark, flashlight in hand, over this dried lava resembling food remains, when she suddenly stopped short. She looked back at my mom, then down in front of her, then back at mom, then down again. Then she bellowed, in a way only a four-year-old can bellow:

“That. Is a big fucking hole.”

My mom, in relaying this story to me via telephone, chuckled at this point. I asked whether she’d punished my sister for using a bad word.

“Well I started to scold,” my mom said. “But then I got up to where she was and I looked down and I'm telling you, this hole was the size of a house. I mean, she was right. It was a big fucking hole.”

Moral of the story: Proper usage justifies crude language by a preschooler.

I love my family.

Girl Talk: A New Live Music Frontier

I WANT TO BE THERE.

I come from a family of concert-goers. When I was a kid, my mom met my stepdad while following the Grateful Dead on tour. As a pre-teen, I made a conscious decision to attend my first "real" concert at Carver-Hawkeye Arena in Iowa City. And I have to tell you, the Backstreet Boys rocked my world that night. I was in 12-year-old heaven. There's nothing better than live music, even if it is pop and partially lip-synced.

(I saw the Backstreet Boys again last summer at Ravinia. Everyone there was female, aged 20 to 35. It was a joyous reunion of my original music community.)

But not many acts patronized Iowa City or Hilo, so it wasn't until I moved to Chicago for college that I had access to the good stuff. Mad Caddies, Pepper, The Decemberists, Reel Big Fish, Maroon 5, My Chemical Romance, Keller Williams, blues clubs -- my tastes cover the spectrum. I took a break from live shows after college; they're expensive, and a bunch of my concert buddies had moved away. My triumphant return was marked by my first Weezer show in January and a single weekend in February that featured both The Decemberists and Keller Williams. But this Friday I embark on a genuine first: I'm seeing Girl Talk.

If you're unfamiliar with Gregg Gillis, aka Girl Talk, allow me to educate you:

The first track off "All Day," the most recent Girl Talk release (November 2010).

He's probably the most famous DJ* touring today, and his specialty is mashing up music -- everything from current pop to gangsta rap to Elton John to the Jackson 5. In performance, he mixes tracks live, so no two shows are the same. He's been called a lawsuit waiting to happen -- technically he doesn't have permission to use the copyrighted music clips -- but he releases his albums for free and asks people to pay whatever they want, citing fair use. And despite criticism, he's gotten away with it for 10 years, two EPs and five full-length albums. (Check them out here.)

What makes this guy amazing is the way he rehabilitates songs we've long since forgotten. For instance, if you never thought L'il Mama and Metallica made fit bedfellows, you've never listened to "Like This" off 2008's Feed the Animals:

Oh yeah, and Mya can come too.

One of my rare regrets from undergrad is skipping the show he played at our student center in 2008. I plan to set the universe right this Friday when my friend Christina and I see him live at the Congress. I expect nothing less than a life-changing experience.

When it comes to live shows, I'm all about preparation. Enjoy with me.

And just for fun: A list of all the artists and songs sampled in Girl Talk's Feed the Animals, courtesy of sjheil on Flickr:


* He's not a fan of the term, but "artist" and "musician" don't really convey a full understanding of how he makes music.

Jack Attack

My mother (of Friday Jams fame) has gotten me hopelessly hooked on Jack White. (After I introduced her to him in the first place, I might add.) For those who don't know, 35-year-old Mr. White is being hailed as the prodigal musician of a generation. He sings, plays every instrument in the band, and was the "under 40" representative on It Might Get Loud, talking guitars and shooting the shit with U2's The Edge and Led Zeppelin's Robert Plant. Kind of a big deal.

The band that introduced him to the spotlight, The White Stripes, announced their official breakup on Wednesday. According to the statement, it's not for any ill reason, but simply that both members (Jack and his ex-wife Meg) are moving on to new projects. Maybe they got sick of playing "Seven Nation Army" over...and over...and over...

It's just so damn catchy.

Happily, Jack's already got a bunch of other stuff going on. He fronts The Raconteurs, who have put out a couple of great records already, and in his newest project he's playing drums, guitar and sharing vocals with Alison Mosshart (of The Kills). My first exposure to The Dead Weather was this provocative video, called "Treat Me Like Your Mother." And yes, my mother showed it to me first.

The live version is just as good if not better. Next time Jack comes to town, who's going with me?

Come on. That's awesome.

Friday Jams

Nom.

I got a lot from my parents. Shelter, food, love and support, an inexplicable love of Velveeta, a sense of humor that relies heavily on teasing. "We tease because we love," my mom would say when I was growing up. Apparently unaware of the tenuous social standing I held at age 13, she'd lean out of the car after dropping me off at my junior high: "Have a good day, Pookie Bear!! I looooove yoouuuuuuu!" Oh. Dear. God.

Beyond a thick skin, perhaps the most tangible thing I inherited from my parents was their insatiable love of music. I grew up listening to Led Zeppelin, Pink Floyd, the Doors, Pearl Jam, Jimi Hendrix. Primus and Blind Melon and Dave Matthews and James Brown and Jamiroquai and Smashing Pumpkins and Phish. It was an eclectic bag, but it was the music I knew. I'd walk around at age three singing "Bag it, tag, it takeitotheboerandohohohoh" -- much like this kid, actually. My first concert was Blues Traveler at age four, and my mom spent a good chunk of my toddlerhood following around the Grateful Dead on tour. That's where she met my stepdad, actually -- on a road trip to a show. Almost 20 years later, they're still together. (D'awwwww.)

Thanks for bringing them together, Jerry!

Eventually I rebelled, music-wise. I brought Spice Girls and boy bands into our home, and things got tense for awhile. I remember once, I was about 10, singing along to some Spice Girls lyrics in the backseat. My mother turned around to look at me, incredulous.

"What are you saying?"

"It's a song, Mom. It's called 'When Two Become One.' It's awesome, it's the Spice Girls!"

She stared at me, perplexed. Then she slowly and silently turned back around. Years later, I finally understood the lyrics, and her horror.

Not that her music was innocent. Curtis Mayfield and Jim Morrison and Patti Smith weren't exactly celibate, drug-free saints. But the thing I was missing in my youth was an appreciation of why my parents (particularly my mother) liked the music they did: It was well-done. Well-produced. Smart, or innovative, or completely original. But most of all, it sounded just as good or better live than it did on an album. Real music cred, real musicians. Most of what I listened to between the ages of 12 and 22 would not fit that criteria. (Sorry, Britney.)

I only get to visit my parents once or twice a year, so each time I go home, I load up on new music. On the most recent trip last month I acquired an immediate obsession with the defunct Chicago band Soul Coughing; before that, it was Keller Williams (who I'm seeing live for the second time next month at the Park West). The Spice Girls and BSB still have a place on my iPod, but now they're relegated to nostalgia.

I won't give up Kelly Clarkson though. She's for real.

Sing it, girl.

My parents, for their part, have continued to evolve in their musical tastes and endeavors. They persist in finding and re-finding bands from every decade; my mom has been on a Jack White binge lately, which I take credit for. (See? It goes both ways!) They probably wouldn't be crushed if most of the 1980's fell into a black hole, though.

A few years ago my parents got it into their heads that they'd be great a running a radio station because, well, they'd probably be great at running a radio station. Especially in Hilo, Hawaii, where most of the FM radio stations are absolute crap. (Sorry, 808 readers, but it's true.) They started organizing and editing their musical collection, digitizing the hundreds of hours of CD music and getting it ready for broadcast. For awhile they maintained an online streaming radio station called Gecko Rock, but that project fizzled after a some months of just a few (but devoted) listeners here and there.

Around the same time, the dreaded happened: My parents joined Facebook. I didn't really mind, but the constant barrage of my mom's Mafia Wars notifications and Dan's links to music videos on YouTube grew tiring, so I pretty much ignored them.

Then something weird happened. They created a new Facebook profile called "Friday Jams" and invited me to be its friend. It turns out there were so many friends posting videos on Dan's wall (in reaction to the 10 videos per hour he'd post himself) that they decided to move it to a separate account dedicated just to music videos. Now with around 100 friends, a solid fifth of whom post regularly, Friday Jams is buzzing almost 24 hours a day with music videos.

Screen shot.

My mom describes it as the best market research for a radio station in history. You post a song and then people post songs related to it; it's an "Oh you like that band? Try this!" method. And it works. Their library has grown exponentially, along with their dreams of running an actual FM station.

The original concept of Friday Jams was that a theme would be posted every Friday - colors, cities, "sticky stuff," jam videos, and the like -- and people could post their hearts out, "like" each others' music, and so forth. But soon people were grumbling that the theme was stale by Monday night, so a new mid-week theme has become a regular feature.

Bring some music and a sense of humor and you'll find a community that welcomes all music tastes with open arms. A favorite theme was "food fight," posted on Thanksgiving. After they ran out of food songs, people started throwing plates and knives and forks. In general, when people get sick of the theme, they'll start threatening to post videos of the Muppets.

What kills me about this whole thing is that my parents -- members of a generation that use Facebook completely differently than mine, and who came after us -- have managed to find a whole new purpose for the number one social networking site. A few individual souls have found their way to Friday Jams on their own, but for the most part my parents invited their friends, who invited their friends, who invited their friends. I friend-suggested John Popper, the front man of Blues Traveler, who accepted the invitation but has yet to post a video. (And I doubt he ever will, but isn't that cool?!)

I really love Blues Traveler.

Friday Jams is the next iteration, the interactive version, of Pandora. And you don't have to pay for it. Whether or not an FM station results, it's absolute genius, for users and founders alike.

And hey, it's Friday! Today's theme? Chicago! Don't worry, I've already covered the Blues Brothers and Kanye and OK Go. If you've got something to add, or if you want to glance in on the fun, check out the phenomenon here.

And don't feel obligated to accept if my mom Facebook friends you. Seriously, the Mafia Wars thing is really annoying.

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UPDATE, 1:31 pm: My mom pointed out that there is a picture from the trip on which she and Dan met. Check it out:

Bunch of hippies. Mom's in the red dress, Dan is fourth from the right, and I'm...noticeably younger.