10 years ago
For some reason unknown to me, I pulled out Pearl Jam’s Ten last night. I must have listened to it five times over, just letting the synesthesia roll over me in waves. Suddenly I’m 17 again, driving around the Island, feeling the power of this kind of rock ‘n’ roll called “grunge” bolster me. I was never a big Nirvana fan (too jangly, I’m ashamed to admit), but PJ was always just melodic enough to please me, but rauchous enough to get my blood flowing.

I remembered how at the top of it all I felt…I was a senior in high school, Seattle had just because the IT place to be making music, and somehow it all made perfect sense. Perhaps it all made sense because I was young and painfully naive, but the early ’90s definitely made Seattle. If nothing else, rent has never been the same since then.

After listening to Ten over and over, I put on some old Mother Love Bone…the band that started it all, lead by Andrew Wood, who grew up in my hometown of Bainbridge Island, and who died of a heroin overdose before he could see the “Seattle sound” take off. If you haven’t listened to MLB’s “Chloe Dancer/Crown of Thorns” lately, you really should listen to it now.

You ever heard the story,
of Mister Faded Glory?
Say he who rides the pony must someday fall,
I been talking to my altar
It says life is what you make it,
And if you make it death well rest your soul
Away, away, away.

(A pleasent effect of listening to PJ and MLB until 2:30 in the morning is that I had dreams about Stone Gossard all morning. And is it just me, or does he starting to get that sexy Eric-Claptonesque-aging-guitarist thang going on?)