can't you settle for the center of attention

In his collection of Unpopular Essays, the philosopher Bertrand Russell discussed the phenomenon he called "the superior virtue of the oppressed," by which the marginalization of certain groups is justified by the attribution of certain intrinsic moral characteristics to those being oppressed. The inherent "compassion" of women, for instance, which allegedly made them ill-suited for pursuits where a degree of ruthlessness is needed, or the enduring patronization of the "noble savage" myth.

What happens, though, when those "virtues" and the concept of "oppression" are self-applied, rather dubiously, via conscious decision?

While I think that writer Chris Claremont's run of X-Men stories are, at least until 1986 or so, pretty entertaining reads, the concept behind the team -- mutant outcasts fighting for a world that hates them -- never really appealed to me. Despite the tendency in some circles to elevate the stories into some grand parable about civil rights, I suspect that the real meat and bones behind the franchise's evergreen appeal is that it speaks so clearly to the anxieties of the adolescent nerd, with protagonists who operate on the fringes of an unsympathetic society and marked for great things though genetic happenstance.

What specifically put me off of the X-Men is the characters sense of insularity. For all the lofty talk of tolerance and equality, the team seemed to revel in their outsider status: "We're X-Men. You're human, you wouldn't understand." Unlike, say, the Avengers, whose membership was open to androids, mutants, rednecks, and even Wonder Man, the X-Men were an echo chamber of melodrama less concerned with asserting their place in society than in endless navel-gazing about their special status....a status predicated on genetic superiority and exclusiveness.

In my travels through the harsh badlands of nerdity, I saw a lot of "outcast as elitist" mentality amongst my peers. It wasn't enough to find a community of like-minded souls or simply accept that one's tastes were skewed differently from the masses' baseline, there had to be a cosmic reason for it, rooted in a "us versus them" mentality. There are many valid reasons why some marginalized and persecuted groups and individuals might turn a bit insular. Growing up closeted in a ultra-homophobic environment, for example, would understandably lead to a certain sense of guardedness. The head cheerleader making fun of your Boba Fett t-shirt? Not so much. It would be one thing if it manifested as a egalitarian pan-geek celebration, but in practice the insularity has taken the form of a hierarchy of fan-tustans, judged from inside the barricades of each individual microcosm; videogame geeks look down on comic book geeks who look down on roleplayers who look down on videogamers.

When you factor in the pervasiveness of power fantasies within the scene's holy scriptures, it's shouldn't come as a surprise -- though it does for many people -- that there's a disturbing undercurrent of crypto-fascism amongst (mostly male) nerds that manifests itself in many troubling ways:

- The unironic appreciation of the anti-hero/bad ass/monster in heroic clothing. ("...and then he tortured the bad guy by slicing the dude's balls off! That's how the cops should do things in real life!")

- Celebration of violent masculinity (usually coupled with mockery of feminism or homosexuality). ("It makes no scientific sense for a female character in a fantasy game where orcs and dragons exist to have the same maximum strength score as a male!")

- An infatuation with a mythologized reactionary past, with apologias regarding totalitarian or militarist regimes and leaders. ("Hitler's mistake is that he should have dropped his hatred of the Jews and concentrated on the Soviets...")

All the above behaviors (and more) were witnessed during my stint as president of the campus sci-fi club. I took the job specifically to keep it out of the hands of those who wanted those quite pathetic vestments of authority too much, and my approach to leadership was hands-off in the extreme. Even still, I had a hard time shaking off the efforts of the rank and file who wanted to build a cult of personality around me. (Yeah, I know. It shocked the hell out of me, too. I had to sneak out of the club room when I went record shopping, lest an uninvited retinue follow me to Central Square.)

Things went south after I started dating Maura and neglected the vicarious needs of my flock, who then gravitated to a master of braggadocio (GTA IV players: Imagine a real-life Brucie). Within a matter of weeks they were reciting his bullshit sex-and-violence stories with awestruck reverence, declaring war upon his "enemies," and mimicking his leather-jacket-and-combat-boots mode of dress. I quit showing up after that, but I'm certain the party armbands were printed up not long afterwards.

Nick Lowe - Little Hitler (from Jesus of Cool, 1978) - Um, actually, this pop rock gem falls outside the established Third Reich canon. You'd know that if you read my Naziwiki page.

(The above ruminations were unabashedly inspired by the talented Dave Lartigue's far superior post featured here.)

damn the consequences

Garbage - When I Grow Up (from Version 2.0, 1998) - It's not conformity. It's evolution. Being able to let things go is just as important as knowing what to hold on to.

As for Garbage, I was emphatically unimpressed with the band upon their debut, as they seemed to be simply a vehicle for alterna-angst and crotch shots. (When the band performed "Only Happy When It Rains" at an MTV awards show back in the mid-1990's, there was a decidedly disturbing gynecological approach to the videography.) My originally negative reaction to the band has mellowed somewhat over the years, to the point where I have to admit that they were among the most enjoyable of the mainstream-in-alternative-clothing acts foisted on the world during the Clinton years.

push it to the floor till the engine screams

I work at one of Greater Boston’s many universities, and one of the great perks of my job is the unbridled opportunities for people-watching it provides. Every trip to the restroom, vending machines, or ATM yields insightful (and often painful) glimpses into the lives of that strange breed of creature known as the “college student.”

Although nothing will ever top the time I quite literally ran into two wild turkeys out for a late afternoon stroll behind one of the lecture halls, yesterday’s sojourn in search of some decent vend-o-fare did include some interesting material for the empirical anthropologist. At the entrance to one of the college buildings, I crossed paths with a rather hirsute and odiferous individual who bore all the distinct markings of the stereotypical male sci-fi/comics/RPG fan, right down to the patchy beard and air of disdainful superiority.

Considering my well documented set of hobby-horses and other assorted interests, it may seem hypocritical for me to tag others of the tribe with labels. Fandom is not monolithic, however, and as an Algonquin from the Northeast would have been certainly puzzled by certain customs and practices of a member of the plains-dwelling Sioux -- and vice versa -- there are aspects of fan culture which remain baffling to me. I have spent too much time dwelling in the houses of the non-fan, perhaps.

That’s all beside the point, though, because there was something about this particular fanboy that set him apart from his peers: He was carrying a large, old-school boom box with him, with the Star Wars: Episode IV soundtrack blasting from its tinny speakers. In these days of listening technology, where smaller and more personal is better, projecting a full-on sonic assault in a ten-yard radius around one’s self can only be seen as a deliberate act of attention-mongering only slightly more subdued than having John Williams and the London Philharmonic follow one around and play the music live. It struck me as the ultimate realization of fanboy megalomania, the overwhelming compulsion to relentlessly inflict one’s interests upon passers-by, while the passers-by merely roll their eyes and do their best to escape.

One thing that struck me after the fact was “Why the Star Wars theme?” The franchise does have its share of obsessively hardcore adherents, but it has also become part of the mass popcult consciousness. Everyone knows the theme to the first film, even folks with minimal interest in the movies, books, and related ephemera. The fanboy’s choice of music flew in the face of conventional fan-behavior where there’s premium put on exclusivity, which in turn provides opportunities for condescending pedantry: “Oh, you would think that. Obviously you’ve never seen the Japanese laserdisc version.” It’s a form of (arguably) secular Calvinism that puts an emphasis on proselytizing, but only for the sake of reminding those outside the elect that they are stupid, while the proselytizer is a genius. I’d have been less surprised if he’d played the theme to some as-yet-unlicensed-for-American-release anime series, a filk remix of the Man from Atlantis theme, or Rush’s 2112.

It got me to thinking about what tracks I’d select for my own intrusively blasted theme song (though I pray that I’ll never have to face that particular demon). After careful consideration, I narrowed the field down to two worthy candidates. The final choice would depend on my mood at the time:

Mike Post & Pete Carpenter – Drive (Theme to Hardcastle & McCormick) (from Television’s Greatest Hits, Vol. 6, 1996) – The original and superior version of the show’s theme song (with vocals by David Morgan). Truly the brightest, most glorious moment in the mismatched crimefighting duo with a bitchin’ high-end car genre of TV shows. Sure it was formulaic pap, but it was formulaic pap that spoke to the hearts and souls of a generation of kids too stupid to know better.

Quincy Jones – The Streetbeater (Theme to Sanford & Son) (from Television’s Greatest Hits, Vol. 3, 1990) – I associate this track with pain, blinding white pain of the nausea-inducing variety. It’s not because I think it’s a bad piece, quite the contrary. Way back in the day when Maura and I first started dating, I was channel surfing and stopped on TV Land just as the theme began to play. I was thrilled; Maura wasn’t and she demanded I change the channel before the tune got stuck in her head. I tried playing “keep away” with the remote, at which point the woman I would eventually marry “accidentally” elbowed me square on the nose, causing me to black out for a few minutes.

My other strange encounter of that was considerably less irritating than the boom box nerd, but far more intriguing. In the courtyard outside the science building stood the most adorable pair of hipster undergrads, a gal and a guy, sharing a single pair of iPod earbuds as they made goo-goo eyes at each other. Ah, young love in bloom, free of all the complications, pregnancy scares, and drunken 2:00 AM phone calls…

As I dragged myself back to my dismal little cubicle, I found myself wondering what song exactly the little lovebirds happened to be listening to. My first guess was Sisqó’s “Thong Song,” the pinnacle of romantic sentiment in Western cultural history. Not even The Bard’s sublime Sonnet 18 (Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?/Thou art more lovely and more temperate) can approach the passionate resonance of “She had dumps like a truck truck truck/Thighs like what what what/Baby move your butt butt butt.” (Ed. note: I’d sooner vote Republican than post that track here.)

After a little more reflection, I began to wonder if perhaps “Thong Song” was a little too much freak to handle in that gooey stage of their relationship. Maybe they were listening to more intellectually stimulating romantic material, like “Anthrax” from Gang of Four's 1979 LP Entertainment! It’s a heartwarming analysis of love as lensed though the Marxist concept of alienated labor and as compared to a deadly spore-borne illness. It’s one of the all time great make-out songs, too.

Then it hit me, and it was so painfully obvious that I cursed myself for not realizing it sooner. There is only one song that truly, madly, deeply captures the that sort of bliss in musical form, and that song is:

Commander Cody – Two Triple Cheese, Side Order of Fries (from Lose It Tonight, 1980) – In the days when I used to buy used vinyl by the pound, the “C – Misc.” bins in every secondhand records shop in the metro Boston area were packed to the partitions with Commander Cody (with and without The Lost Planet Airmen) LPs. I never purchased any, but it made me contemplate why these stores just didn’t create dedicated slots for Mr. Frayne and company. Was it a case of hipper-than-thou audiophile bias against blue collar “boogie woogie” rock? Or simple laziness?

(The illustration for today's post was courteously provided by the incomparable Chris Sims.)

not an imaginary story

I noticed that there's a trend among the hip, witty, and smart comics-blogging set to sit down with a copy of Previews, the monthly distributor's catalog of comics and related nerd detritus, and comment on the good, bad, and ugly found within its pages.

I used to look forward to the arrival of each fresh issue of Previews in my (my wife's, actually) subscription box, and would give it an intense going over, marking page after page of stuff I probably didn't need but certainly wanted. As I underwent my slow transition from nerd faithful to nerd agnostic, I found myself falling out of my impulse purchasing habits and my perusals grew less enthusiastic and more infrequent, leaving the advance ordering in Maura's hands.

But, hey! Maura happened to leave the current issue on the coffee table and all the cool kids are doing write-ups on it, so why not try my own hand in this sordid business?

This may take a while to flip through, so please enjoy this soothing bossa nova/lounge classic while you wait for me to finish:

Sérgio Mendes & Brasil '66 - Mas Que Nada (from Herb Alpert Presents..., 1966)

Let's see...not interested...not interested...more licensed nonsense...cookie cutter manga titles...jeez, is there a character in the Star Wars universe whose backstory hasn't been the basis of a 12-issue miniseries?

Expensive retrological kipple for deep pocketed hipsters...continuity porn...one million Countdown tie-ins for Emperor Didio...oh, look, the rush to ride on Phonogram's coat tails has begun...there aren't nearly enough Batman action figures...Boobies!

Wow, it's taking longer than I thought. Here's another familiar, retro easy listening standard to tide you over:

Herb Alpert & The Tijuana Brass - Spanish Flea (from Going Places, 1965) - "Bachelor #1, if I was a graded fine condition copy of Giant Size X-Men #1, how would you handle me?"

Back at it...not interested...looks actionably similar to another, better title...wait for the trade paperback release...no, I don't give a shit about how funny your nerd friends are...the same applies to your role-playing game war stories...sorry, your webcomic wasn't worth reading when it was free, never mind reprinted on paper for three bucks...not interested...wow, how can that woman stay upright with that spine and those breasts?

Dead horse flogging...I don't need to read your sanctioned fanfic about a supporting character in a cancelled TV show...I think the franchise appeal has gone past its due date...not interested...when you reach that tier of character recognizability, it's time to find something new to make statues of....too expensive at half the price...boobies....more boobies...I'd like to know the market for this, because they have too much money and would be willing to part with it for some magic beans from my garden, I suspect...and Sterling and Lartigue have both pointed this out already, but seriously, WHY LORD WHY? (No, I do not want to hear the answer to that.)

Thank Providence that Maura doesn't pick up Marvel's too-cool-for-school separate catalog of advance solicitations, or hospitalization might have been required.

Apart from a newfound respect for those brave souls who willingly submit themselves to this torture on a monthly basis, I came away from my foolishly self-inflicted ordeal with a whopping list of three things that caught my interest:

1. Metal Men #3 - The first issue of this relaunch featuring DC's goofy Silver Age psuedo-science icons was a pretty solid read, if a bit too cluttered with the CRAZY-ASS WOW factor so in vogue these days. Personally, I'd have preferred it to skew a bit more towards Bob Kanigher's 1960's take and less towards present-day Grant Morrison's, but I know I'm in the minority.

2. Yotsuba&! Vol. 5 - I'm really glad I discovered this book just as ADV began to resume publishing new volumes on a regular basis. It's just so damn charming without feeling syrupy or contrived.

3. the Final Fantasy VII statue featuring Aeris channeling the Lifestream - It's more along Maura's line than mine, and the $220 price tag places it beyond the threshold of justifiable purchase, but, wow, is it nice.

Captain Sensible - (What d'Ya Give) The Man Who's Gotten Everything? (from a 1982 7"; collected on A-Sides, Part 1, 1995) - When the Captain of The Damned met Crass. How cool is that?

Vacation II: Day 6 - You're driving me insane

It’s human nature to evangelize on behalf on the things we enjoy. A certain thing will strike a chord with us, and we feel the urge to rush off and share the experience with others, whose reactions may or may not match our own. You can lead a horse to water, but often enough the horse is too busy eyeing the low hanging apples in the orchard across the way to care.

And that’s fine, even if there are fewer things more frustrating than when one of the initially nonplussed becomes a convert later on, and attempts to proselytize you with the same damn thing they ignored your original recommendation about previously:

“You’ve got to hear this band. They’re awesome!”

“You mean the band whose CD I gave you as a birthday present last year?”

“Did you? I don’t remem-GAK! Why…are…you…strangling…me?”

Again, it’s all part of the game of social relationships, and not a big deal. Taste is a very personal and a very mutable thing, and responds erratically to the hard sell technique. Individuals enjoy what they enjoy, and despite the best efforts of marketing departments, there are no infallible predictors on what will click with people. As the old saying goes, there is no accounting for taste, and it’s to one’s benefit socially to keep that in mind, even if the various manifestations of the principle are baffling in the extreme.

There are limits to my vive le difference attitude, however, and they mostly center around the ennoblement of one’s personal tastes. It’s been pointed out time and again that just because you like something doesn’t mean that it’s good. I’m willing cut a little slack regarding that, if only because “good” is an entirely subjective term. I can accept that there are people who think Love Story or The Da Vinci Code are “good” for reasons other than their relative quality vis a vis other books, but I draw the line at beatification, where the descriptor takes on an almost religious significance.

There’s a difference between enjoying The Doors’ music (or even holding up Jim Morrison as an important figure in the history of pop music) and treating the band’s music and mythology as the Word Incarnate. I use The Doors as an example because the absurdly hagiographical tenor of No One Here Gets Out Alive, read while I was a teenager, that first brought this phenomenon to my attention. Examples abound, though, including the cults that have sprung up around two of my favorite bands, The Clash and The Pogues, which I believe diminish their legacies through unquestioned superlatives and platitudes.

Apart from the pop music sphere, these attitudes are also distressingly common in the many permutations of the nerd-o-sphere: comics, gaming, sci-fi and fantasy literature. Nerd behavior (and I say this as one of the herd) trends towards the obsessive end of the spectrum to start. The leap from fan to cultist is not an especially long one, but it is discernable. One telltale sign is a reliance on received wisdom over personal insight:

“The Watchmen is the greatest comic ever.”
“Why?”
“Because of Alan Moore.”
“I’m not seeing the logic there.”
“Everyone says it’s the best.”
“Still not seeing your argument.”
“Entertainment Weekly said it was the best comic ever.”

The last bit of that fictional, but reality-based, exchange brings up another factor into the sanctification process: the need of certain nerd-types for outside validation of their interests.

Years of operating at the fringes of “mundane” (and, oh, do I despise that term) society has led to a particular, vulgar iteration of what has been called the “superior virtue of the oppressed.” In the common usage of the term, it applies to the dominant culture’s paternalist romanticization of an oppressed group. “Women are too virtuous by nature to deal with politics, thus we cannot allow them the vote,” and so forth and so on. In nerd culture, it’s applied by the fringe to itself, a consensual self-image mirroring that of the X-Men, super-cool outcasts hated and feared by a jealous world.

Yet for all this pretence of setting themselves apart, there need for validation remains strong, and things like a mention on ET of Nick Cage’s comics collection or some mediocre comedian dropping a nerdy inside reference into his routine gain a disproportionate level of significance. Liking something is not enough, that THEY like it too is what matters, as THEY (be it Wil Wheaton or Vin Diesel) then equal US.

I find this marginalization of a work’s or creative force’s very personal appeal in favor of a declared significance deeply depressing. There should be no shame in just liking -- or even loving something -- for what it is, rather than as a magic mirror by which to define one’s self though reflected light. Or to be comfortable in one’s own skin, rather than living vicariously as an acolyte in a mystery religion dedicated to an entertaining diversion, be it London Calling, Ender’s Game, The Great Gatsby, “How Soon Is Now?” or what have you.

Gerry & The Pacemakers – I Like It (from The Definitive Collection, 1995) – Like eating a large bag of mini-marshmallows and washing it down with a quart bottle of chocolate syrup. So just another typical day round these parts, then. The Rezillos did a scathing, yet no less syrupy, cover of the song on 1978’s Can’t Stand The Rezillos LP.

Gloria Jones – Tainted Love (from a 1964 single; collected on Rude Boy Revival, 2002) – Sometimes, it pays to go back to the source. No bloops, no bleeps, no nasally British vocalist, just pure, uncut Northern Soul.

it took me by surprise

Do you remember the first time? It was con season, and the musty funk of bromidrosis was heavy in the air, despite the best efforts of the venue’s state of the art ventilation system.

We met in the dealers’ room. I was debating on whether to purchase a bootleg VHS tape of Project UFO episodes when I saw you haggling over the price of fansubbed anime DVD’s. A wandering troubadour dressed as an Andorian segued from an insular bit of filk about Aldiss’ Helliconia novels to what would become our song…

Bantha tracks, take me home
To the place I belong
Anchorhead Station, Twi’lek slave girls
Take me home, bantha tracks

…and I knew it was love at first sight.

It’s a shame that you turned out to be a Kyle Rayner fan. I could never settle down with a person unwilling to recognize that Hal Jordan is the one true Green Lantern.

The Boys – First Time (from The Boys, 1977) – There’s always room for quality power pop.

Jay and The Americans – This Magic Moment (from Sands of Time, 1968) – Sixties nostalgia, sixties-style!

love me, love my action figure collection

“It never would have worked out. I caught her trying to file her Fried Green Tomatoes DVD after my copy of John Carpenter’s The Fog.”

Is this really an issue? And if it is, shouldn’t the couples involved be forced to separate, if not for their own sakes, then for the sake of the gene pool?

Every successful relationship comes down to series of compromises -- some large, some small -- concerning personal quirks and preferences that weave themselves into the fabric of the partnership, so that over time the actual boundaries fade into the background of consensual habit. Granted, some behaviors are more bothersome than others, but if you’ve chosen to partner up with someone who is habitually late for events, you weigh the irritation factor versus your affection for said partner and either learn to deal with it or decide to call it a day and move on. There’s always the chance of flare ups within the contested zones, but if the relationship is solid, these function as tension release valves or minor corrective efforts, and not fault lines from which bad break ups arise.

Relationship issues over merging media collections, though? That’s just plain stupid. I know there are some folks who are outright anal about keeping a cross-referenced and spreadsheet-tabulated archive of their books, CDs, and DVDs, but isn’t that the sort of thing a romantic partner would figure out early on in a relationship and accommodate for accordingly? There will always be adherents of the “I can change him or her” school who will play along until the pact is formally sealed (although I’d argue that such antics encode their own seeds of self-destruction), but when you fall in love with a person who, for example, is absolutely devoted to her pet rabbits, it’s unrealistic to think “Hey, I’ll try and convince her that rabbits are terrible pets, and that any home we make together will be lagomorph-free!” Again, it’s all about the willingness to accommodate or compromise, if you think a certain person is destined to be “the one.”

Maybe the columnists were being squeezed by a deadline, and needed some quick fluff to fill space, but the technicalities of merging possessions seem like something that any two people in a working relationship should have been able to figure out prior to living together. Kind of like how I instinctively know what songs to avoid when assembling a mix CD for the wife’s and my work commute, or why I never even raised the question of whether or not we were going to hang the gatefold poster cover of Crass’s Feeding the 5000 (a photo of a desiccated hand tangled in barbed wire, with the caption “Your country needs you” in big block letters) on the living room wall. Besides, unless you lead an extremely Spartan lifestyle or plan on moving into an eighteen room mansion, it’s highly unlikely that there will be enough room both your and your partner’s accumulated masses of stuff.

In our case, it was an organic affair, where we tossed all our stuff into massive piles in the attic, and gradually pulled things from the mess as needed and/or wanted. Anime artbooks share space with graphic novels, history and science texts with sci-fi and horror paperbacks, DVD box sets with Xbox and PS2 games. At the moment, our endtable is groaning under a stack of issues of Shojo Beat, a coffee table book on videogames, and my old Traditions of Western Drama anthology from college, with no Congress of Vienna-style negotiations required. The contents of our communal CD racks have developed along similar lines; various personal favorites cohabitate side by side with no fear of musical cootie contagion.

Vive le difference, and all that. Keeping in the spirit of things, here are two tracks pulled from two neighboring discs, one from one of Maura’s favorites and one from mine, with neither of us seeing the appeal of the other’s selection…

Nina Hagen – Russian Reggae (from …In Ekstasy, 1985) – I just don’t get it, but the wife loves Frau Hagen’s colorfully far-out punk/pop/sci-fi stylings. She even wants to name our first daughter “Nina Marlene Roxy” after Hagen, and her two other musical heroes: Lene Lovich and Roxy Epoxy. It’s a much better choice than “Kayleigh” or “Madison,” I concede.

Throwing Muses – The River (from House Tornado, 1988) – The Muses are an “eh” from Maura, who associates them with the more irritating and pretentious fans she used to know back in the late 80’s (not as much as she does with The Pixies, who are beyond the pale, as far as she’s concerned; a feeling I happen to share with her). I enjoy the band’s quirky, opaque brand of indie rock, though I prefer to ride the sonic currents of their songs and not seek deeper truths in their lyrics.

my spells cannot be broke

The final gate stood before them, its adamantite bars shining in the flickering torchlight. Beyond lay the inner sanctum of the Gheshezimar the Witch King. The muscular half orc snorted dismissively. The stink of foul magic was heavy in the air. The end of his journey was near at hand, a quest for vengeance that had bought him across half of Xyrolia. Gheshezimar’s thrice-damned soul would join those of his spider-limbed minions in the Abyss.

The barbarian gripped the bars in his massive hands and attempted to lift the gate. The sinews in his shoulder blades knotted and popped with the strain, but the barrier would not lift. “By the fire caves of Zamphr!” he bellowed, “I shall not be denied!”

His slender companion stepped up to the gate. “Allow me,” he hissed, and made a quick gesture with his ebon fingers. Sparkling tendrils snaked from his hands and wrapped around the bars. Slowly the gate began to lift. The barbarian did not approve of such arcane trickery, but he had come to grudgingly respect Nightshade D’rozz’s talents during the many kizmals they had journeyed together. The dark elf mage had proven his worth once again.

No sooner had the gate opened than a shadowy form lunged from the dark passage beyond, screaming profane curses in the long dead language of the Lala-Bar. “A wraithling!” Nightshade screamed, and scrambled to prepare another spell. The half orc barbarian was quicker, and swung his massive axe at the attacker. The blade went wide of the target, shattering on the stone wall of the dungeon. The wightling closed in for the kill….

“What the hell? How could I have missed it? I’m swinging a dire axe that’s as wide as the passage and I have triple weapon specialization!”

“Well, if you account for the speed factor and the encumbrance penalty on initiative…”

“But the axe was forged by the Dwarfsmiths of Hron! It’s supposed to be unbreakable!”

“Um, yeah, well, I think there’s a table that covers that in the Big Dudes With Axes Survival Guide. Just give me a minute; I’m going to look it up. Wait, did I bring that book with me?”

“Aw, screw this. I’m going to see what’s on TV.”

Ah, the raw stuff of nerdy adolescent maleness, roughly shaped by popcult touchstones and polyhedral dice, and set to the dulcet peals of heavy metal thunder… It’s truly a wonder to behold.

I’ve played in hyper-sophisticated, tightly run role-playing campaigns where every in-game location has been mapped down to individual trees and bushes and the game master stressed the importance of “playing in character.” They were admirable, often enjoyable, efforts, but lacked the unrefined entertainment value derived from a cabal of socially awkward misfits cracking the seal on the Dungeons and Dragons Basic (“Red Box”) Set for the first time.

Give an experienced gamer a rule book, some dice, and a character sheet, and you’ll end up with “Eldremere Lightspear, Son of Ulthren, Protector of the Silver Forest and Bloodthrall of the Lady’s Kithband,” complete with a family tree, detailed backstory, and minute personal details.

Give the same to a fourteen year old boy in a Scorpions t-shirt circa 1985 and you’d get this:

Sophisticated characterization and internal logic are fine and all, but when you’re a geeky pubescent manchild trying to grapple with personal power fantasies, there’s nothing like kicking some ass in a dungeon haphazardly populated by a random assortment of the “coolest” monsters listed in the Fiend Folio (“’Cause that was, like, on sale for four bucks at Kay-Bee, and the Monster Manual was, like fifteen.”). It’s a realm where the rules, when properly understood (i.e. not often), are reduced to mere guidelines. The average strength score is 18/00 (the whole 18-slash-percentage strength rating for AD&D always struck me as rather stupid, and opened too many opportunities for meta-gaming), and every character is either a Half-Orc barbarian or multiclassed Dark Elf fighter/magic user/thief. Oh, and did I mention the harem girls?

It’s stupid, nonsensical, and immature (plus frequently sexist), but I have a certain weakness for that form of fantastical yearning. Unpretentious to a fault, it wore its patchwork of influences proudly on its sleeve. The Sword and the Sorcerer, Conan comics, metal and hard rock songs, pinball machine artwork – all thrown together in a steaming cauldron of testosterone, with the end result resembling an independently invented version of John Norman’s Gor as manifested in an eighth grader’s 3rd period English notebook. (Big thanks to the talented Dave Campbell for providing the excellent artwork that leads off today’s post. He nailed the concept perfectly.)

It might seem odd for me to wax nostalgic over such things, given my track record of bitching about the excesses of nerd behavior, especially those associated with the male side of the fan divide. It’s a matter of context, really. There are worse ways for an adolescent boy to work through his issues than projecting his self worth onto a larger than life fictional avatar named Doomhammer for a few months. As a step toward maturity, it’s no big deal, and kind of interesting to look back upon. As a developmental terminus, it’s creepy as fuck.

Even if I still gamed, I wouldn’t want to participate in such a campaign, even if it was possible to overcome my accumulated wisdom and approach it as fresh and free of irony as I did twenty-odd years ago. There are some aspects of youth that cannot be recaptured, no matter how hard one tries. I’ll just have to content myself by watching Deathstalker and The Warriors From Hell for the umpteenth time.

Improbably named and costumed characters? Check. Happens in a universe that is not so much a physical location as an abstract series of events linked together with the thinnest of plot threads? Check. The hero is an obnoxious asshole? Check. Acts of derring-don’t-make-much-sense? Check. Despite the absence of a heavy metal soundtrack, Deathstalker and The Warriors From Hell is the purest realization of a beginner’s D&D run ever caught on film. Potatoes are what we eat.

On to today’s xvart-stomping, blade-swinging, well-oiled and waxed collection of songs:

It’s kind of funny to consider that heavy metal’s fixation with fantasy themes grew out of the 60’s hippie counterculture, by way of Led Zeppelin’s shared fascination with Tolkien and Black Sabbath’s incorporation of 70’s occultist elements, with some Wagnerian (Richard, not Jack) bombast thrown in for good measure. It’s not that long a road from the peace sign to the mark of the beast, if you think about it.

Dio – Holy Diver (from Holy Diver, 1983) – I probably could have skipped all the overblown writing today and just posted this track and its video, which sum things up more effectively than my tortured prose ever could. (Did you know there was a NES game based on this song? Friend CJ has the scoop.)

Savatage – Hall of the Mountain King (from Hall of the Mountain King, 1987) – I saw Savatage open for Testament back in the late 80’s. I can’t remember if was at the Orpheum or the Channel, which reveals two embarrassing facts about me:

1. I can be very forgetful.
2. I paid to see Testament twice.

Don't forget to catch the video. It's priceless.

Deep Purple – Stormbringer (from The Very Best of Deep Purple, 2000) – Blood and souls for my Lord Blackmore! Thank you, Tanelorn! The Last Emperor of Melniboné says “Goodnight!”

the visitors are our friends

From the land of Kow Pad Gai and Thaksinomics, here’s the pop duo Raffy Nancy (not a collaboration between this fellow and this unfortunate soul, although that would have been something to behold) with “UFO”:



No, I don’t understand it, either.

My wife picked up this album back when she watched a lot of Asian music video programs on the International Channel. The paucity of decent pop music at the time led her far off the beaten path. As a consequence, her CD collection is full of some really bizarre stuff, both foreign and domestic, from the early-to-mid 1990’s.

Raffy Nancy – UFO (from Raffy Nancy) - I'm unsure of the exact release dats, seeing as how I can't read Thai. There's an Independence Day reference in the video, which places it sometime after the summer of 1996 or thereabouts.

The more astute – or nerdy – among you may have noticed that the title for today’s post comes from the excellent sci-fi miniseries (and absolutely terrible ongoing TV series) V. When the hype machine surrounding Independence Day started up, the marketing people placed ads featuring a massive flying saucer hovering over New York in nearly every subway station in Boston. My friend and I came up with a plan to paint giant red V’s over all of the posters. We didn’t carry it out, though, because we were cowards and we were lazy. It would have been really funny…for the handful of people able to understand the joke.