I’m a member of a news/e-mail group that focuses on underground rock and other esoteric music styles. I cannot tell you the name of the group, but if you really care, very minor detective work is needed. Members include label founders, magazine editors, semi-famous band members, and a lot of writers. What seems to prevail in this little club? Music nerds who are uptight, music nerds who are humorless, music nerds who are infuriating perfectionists, music nerds who are absolutely out of touch, music nerds who are terminally hip…you know, exactly what you’d expect. I should stress the poor or absent senses of humor. No surprises. It’s a reliable waste of time that I should have cancelled years ago. At the least, I’m guilty of getting sucked into certain threads. I’m also guilty of baiting my co-nerds, so much so that I was nearly kicked off two years ago for starting a flame war with the music editor of a very well known entertainment weekly. I made fun of the Amphetamine Reptile label, and somewhere along the line, I referred to Jim O’Rourke as “Jim O’Whoreke”. This guy, plus a few other stodgy fuckers, went nuts on my ass, so to speak. I played silent after a few entries, letting them believe that they were tearing me a new one. The moderator jumped in to cool things off. I happily obliged, but the editor in question quit the group because I was allowed to stay on. Several weeks ago, I replied to a thread about Sonic Youth taking lesser-known bands on tour with them. My reply was full of loaded, short sighted, and half-correct claims. My satisfaction level was high, as you could almost feel rock-nerd sphincters tightening throughout the group. Here it is:

“I too found the new SY to be great. Even Gordon, of
whom I have minuscule use for musically, turns out
that super-strong opener, “Pattern Recognition.” It
would be an even better instrumental record, but
Thurston and co. gotta keep reminding the choir that
Bush and Justin Timberlake are bad, so no go there.
And there has always been an agenda with tour
support/noise love/indie rock guilt. Thurston may pour
out glowing record reviews of food-stained, screaming
48-year-olds who mic malfunctioning space heaters, run
it through a delay pedal, and release it in ed. of 300
with a poorly photo-copied pictures of a ball-gagged
teenagers on the cover under the nebulous umbrella of
free form noise, but when it comes to a choice between
that and the painfully hip Wolf Eyes…when there is
little artistic difference…we all know who gets the
opening slot. At least Wolf Eyes seem to have some
sense of history, as opposed to The Black Dice, who
are gladly ignorant of the fact that they turn the
past 15 years of Bananafish compilations into an
aggressive yawn-fest. I don’t see any new minds
getting blown by Wolf Eyes, I see more beers being
purchased, cigarettes being smoked outside, and gossip
exchanged during their set. If SY really wanted to
live up to all of the intensely self ballyhooed
extra-indie interests, they should give an opening
slot to Morbid Angel.”

I erased many of the responses, making this post as a whole just as worthless as my dickering about in that thread club. I do remember the response of a certain highly respected, well known (and very nice) bass playing journeyman: “Whoa, now, hold on…..”