Random Musical Thing -

59 TIMES THE PAIN

There are very few (perhaps 4) cases in which I can absolutely remember the time I heard my first song from a band that came to mean anything to me. One of these bands was Husker Du.

Husker Du was the only US punk (if that is the word) band that mattered. I would have loved them if for no other reason than, upon hearing them MSM asked me if I was playing the record (yep, vinyl) at the right speed.

That kind of generational misunderstanding is priceless to a young man, and it made me love Husker Du even more than their trebly fury already had.

Sometime in my college years (as it took me over 20 years to get my B.S., this is an inexact measure) and somewhere in Berkeley, I was listening to KALX, the best college radio station in the world. It was pretty late and, as is my style, I was under the influence of something. I’m a fan of sleep, but it has never been a fan of me and I was sensibly medicating this… then this song came on… crazy rollicking rhythm track (wildly busy drummer), snarly-assed guitars that loped in crippled fashion, and (sometimes incomprehensible) angry lyrics.

Then, there was that funny chorus “59 times the pain.” This must have been written with college students in mind: All the angst one needs in a handy overdose of pain and a peculiarly specific number attached to it. This was made for young-angst.

I had never heard anything like it.

KALX had many advantages and one was that they played monstrously long sets. Another was that they back-announced everything they played. These two advantages kept me up that night. I struggledto stay awake as the set went on with songs from various unknown bands.

Finally, finally, the DJ back announced the song and I wrote the name down and then went to a lovely drug-induced sleep.

Next day it was off to Amoeba records to buy “New Day Rising” which proved to be packed with nifty slices of anger and despair.

Over the next couple of months I purchased their back-catalog (by the time I came upon them they had already released the seminal “Zen Arcade”) and each and every tape/recording was a winner. As I look at my current IPod collection I note that Husker Du is #2 in terms of number of songs. Losing that title to Elvis Costello is no shame (I’m a bit embarrassed by how well Elton John and Hanoi Rocks do!).

I suppose this kind of happy revelation is unlikely in the land of K-Pop.

Still, my little stop in Korea has allowed me the time to remember the songs I loved in previous days, and the bandwidth to “capture” (‘steal’ is such a loaded word) them.

Next up for download.. alla Nirvana and alla Iggy…