There is something inherently trippy about listening to the Nine Inch Nails. Listen to the strains of Just Like You Imagined as they remind you of something grand, something abstract, the sort of feeling bittersweet dreams of longing are made of. The pain that's so great that it's almost sweet as it stirs you and rips out your heart.
Listen to The Perfect Drug to feel that obsession course through your blood. To feel it under your skin. Insidious, and inescapable. The feeling of being dirty, being compelled, and still completely hating yourself for being that what you are, but loving the sensation of being exactly that, loving the feeling of self loathing and giving in to addiction.
Listen to Closer to feel that animal lust course through you, feel it take you over. Rip out every shred of your humanity. Feel the lust envelop you, as your eyes close involuntarily and you squirm to the beat and the absolutely divine feeling of being sinful. You can feel yourself yearn for the friction as the heat of the images burning on the inside of your eyelid overwhelm you.
Listen to Hurt to feel real pain. Real exhaustion. The absolute musical embodiment of pathos and loneliness and lack of dignity in being completely devoid of hope and brimming with the tragedy of loss of your self, loss of those who were dear, and the loss of youth, opportunity and aspiration.
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I really cannot fathom a life without music - a song in my head, a tune on my lips. A beat coursing through the paths in my head, moving my legs, keeping me going. Marching to the beat not of any known drummer, but thinking of a 4 x 4 all the while. The lyrics, as I imagine then, rather unlike the entire reality, as they echo in my head, spouting rhyming little bits of flotsam some of which strike a chord, and others which just cause me to be lost in an entirely new universe. I love music.
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Just struck some Metallica on Grooveshark. None of their new fucking crap. And right now I'm singing along with Low Man's Lyric at the top of my voice. I can't believe how much this hits me every time, every single time I listen to it. It's absurd. Scary. Just irrational. But I can't bring myself to care. His voice in the song is so raw, so full of feeling - harsh, abrasive, it rubs you the wrong and the right way all at once. And the words - they make poetry. They really do. This is hyperbole we've all heard before, but I mean it. It's performing art, not commercial rock music. But that's a Metallica from before.
And of course, the Unforgiven II. Now, I've heard over and over again how the second Unforgiven is inferior to the first. I don't care. I love it. The song has true feeling attached to it. I know I'm running out of adjectives, but I sometimes feel Unforgiven II is actually a kind of musical symphony. It isn't complex, but that guitar lick gets imprinted on my brain, and then the music never leaves.
Then, AC/DC. Bikes on a highway, people in leather, screechy guitars, screechier vocals, and that drumbeat and that guitar - guaranteed to put a spring in your step, and to make you want to feel tough, make you want to look good, look retro. You keep trying to sing, keep trying to sound that hoarse like in Back in Black - it sounds just so fucking cool. Damn.
"I'm out for what I can get -
If you know what I mean;
If you know what I mean;
Women to the left of me,
Women to the right -
And got no gun,
And got no gun,
And got no knife;
Don't you start no fight.
'Coz I'm TNT - I'm dynamite
'Coz I'm TNT - I'm dynamite
And I'll win the fight ... "
Definitely not the most intelligent words out there. But guaranteed to make you smile. And guaranteed to make you wish for some aviators, and the wide open roads. The true spirit of Rock n' Roll. Here's to hoping it'll never die.
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So, what's on my music menu? I got myself some of the musical complexity and the epic storytelling of Iron Maiden, the trippy and absolutely adorable Pixies in 'Hey', the anthem Born to be Wild by Steppenwolf, and Wolfmother. I'm going to have me a good couple of hours.
It's good to have you back, boys. Let's make some noise.
