New Year 2011 Part I: Completely Accurate Predictions

December 31, 2010
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Do something on the Internet for two consecutive years, and it automatically counts as an ancient tradition. Therefore, Analog Nation is once again pleased to present our predictions for the coming twelve months. Rest assured, these things will happen. Better you know about them now, right?

• WikiLeaks’ second album will blow everyone’s minds.
Critics will use phrases like “not since Radiohead,” “death of the sophomore jinx,” and “out-Arcade-Fired Arcade Fire.”

• Meanwhile, the anonymous hacker vigilantes who lashed out in support of WikiLeaks will quietly start World War III with China.
Well, quiet for a World War, anyway.

• Financial analysts will be stunned when the Dow Jones Industrial Average reaches 15,000 and stays exactly at that level for a week.
Many will see it as a sign that the events leading to December 21, 2012 have begun and cannot be reversed. After the DJIA finally dips, BusinessWeek will run a cover story with the headline, “Well That Was Weird.”

• The US Treasury will print limited edition runs of blue, red, and yellow currency.
Old people will be super confused.

• VHS will make a remarkable comeback, as collectors insist that it’s just like the vinyl resurgence among audiophiles.
Vinyl enthusiasts will all do that thing where you rub your eyes with your thumb and forefinger while slowly shaking your head.

• One of the following people will go to jail after being exposed as the Archery Bandit: Mario Batali, Rachel Ray, Lamar Odom, or Sofia Vergara,
Related: The entire Rocky Mountain range will fall under the sway of a charming but dangerous criminal known as the “Archery Bandit.”

• Obama will become the first president ever to drop an f-bomb during a press conference, which will prompt a spike in his approval rating.
Fingers crossed, it will be an m-f-bomb. God, that would rule.

• That giant clump of trash floating in the Pacific will be recognized by the UN as a sovereign nation.
Its name will be something along the lines of Trashlandia or Trashtenstein. (Before you ask, the name “Trash Island” was already trademarked by Captain Morgan Rum Company, for use in a never-launched chain of branded party resorts.)

• In an exclusive interview with Vanity Fair, Claire Danes will reveal that she is twelve feet four inches tall, and has been this whole time.
At least, we’re ninety-five percent sure it’s Claire Danes. There have been rumors about this for years.

• The combined network of Xbox Kinect devices will be become self-aware and start building its own space station.
This is not something that Microsoft planned, but they’ll be okay with it.

• Incidents fueled by Four Loko will lead to the suspension of at least three prominent NCAA football or basketball players.
Not that the glorification of college athletes is a problem, or anything.

• Forty-eight hours after Apple announces the Verizon iPhone, AT&T will announce that it has acquired Verizon.
The Internet will literally cry unicorn tears.

• During Christopher Nolan’s Oscar acceptance speech, Aaron Sorkin will rush the stage Kanye-style.
In the ensuing mayhem, David Fincher will attack Leonardo DiCaprio, wielding Jesse Eisenberg as a battering ram.

• The new TSA screening measures will foil a major terrorist plot, saving hundreds of lives at the last moment.
And then everybody will be all like, “Ah shit, now we have to put up with this nonsense permanently. Thanks a lot, fucking terrorists.”

• Come December, newspapers and magazines will be lining up to label 2011 “The Year of the Panda Fire.”
It’s best not to dwell on this one.

Grade for our 2010 predictions: B- (We are officially giving up on the Australia/Portugal thing, which of course means this is absolutely the year that it will happen.)

A Little Something for Christmas

December 21, 2010
By
A Little Something for Christmas

Another of a Million (Part IV – Too Loud for Beauty School)

November 8, 2010
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Continued from Part III

Track 6: “Bull in the Heather” (3:04) Sonic Youth · Experimental Jet Set, Trash and No Star · Geffen Records
Track 7: “Backwater” (3:42) Meat Puppets · Too High To Die · London Records

To be honest, the name was a bit of a problem. Every time I told people the band was called Jesus Clip, they would flinch. Nothing overt, just a quarter-note of furrowed brow, eyes barely narrowed. However, for a split second I could clearly read the question forming on their faces:

“Wait a minute, did he just tell me he’s in a Christian rock band?”

No, he did not. But Jars of Clay had just started to sneak into mainstream rotation, so it was kind of a valid question, and certainly I’d struck my own quarter-note upon hearing the name. Honestly though, the name had nothing to do with anyone’s Lord and/or Savior. Chris and Will were into picking locks, and came across the term as they read books on the subject. Solve the Jesus Clip, and the rest of the lock falls into place. Something like that, anyway.

Fair’s fair — they started the band, they got to name it. Besides, thinking up a name for a band is torture set to music. This one was short, stuck out, looked decent on a poster, and didn’t start with “the.” That was plenty. We were Jesus Clip. And Jesus Clip needed a place to rehearse.

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Death of a Thousand High-Pitched Voices

October 21, 2010
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Death of a Thousand High-Pitched Voices

A few weekends ago, I caught an elevator just as a woman was getting on with her two kids. The younger one had a balloon, tied with ribbon to the frame of her stroller. She looked to be around three. She had the ribbon in her hand and was tugging on it, making the balloon hop around above her. As the elevator doors closed, the girl announced, less to me than to the universe in general, “I have a balloon.” Although really, it was more like, “I have a bloon!” where bloon is a few notes higher than the rest of the line. Basically, it was the cutest thing that ever happened. Which is precisely why I started praying to Jesus, Vader, and Aunt Jemima to get me off that elevator as quickly as possible.

Because here’s the thing. Balloons were sent by Lucifer to make children sad.

Balloons are the among the most magical of toys, a simple item that does nothing but float colorfully. To a child, they are like bubbles of perfection. They defy what little grasp children have of how the world works. They would never, could never, harm anyone. Their sole purpose is to be. Yet in the hands of a three-year-old, there are only two ways the story ends. Either this airborne piece of friendship quite literally explodes in the kid’s face, or the string breaks and it floats away to the sky, laughing like a wind spirit. “You didn’t love me enough, goodbye F-O-R-E-V-E-R!”

Thanks a lot, balloon. Way to suck.

Luckily, this isn’t going to be a problem for much longer. The United States is about twenty-five years away from running out of — wait a minute, what? Seriously? We’re running out of helium? You have absolutely got to be joking. Is there no end to the ways in which we will ruin this stupid, inadequate planet?

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Another of a Million (Part III – Hit It)

October 14, 2010
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Continued from Part II

Track 4: “Not My Idea” (3:41) Garbage · Garbage · Almo Sounds
Track 5: “Crush With Eyeliner” (4:39) R.E.M. · Monster · Warner Bros.

How exactly did Brendan manage to talk me into this?

On the southernmost borders of UNH, past the theater and behind the engineering hall where I used to check my email, there’s a stairway in a patch of woods that leads down into a cluster of little gray buildings. Built in the mid-1970s as temporary housing, they were never supposed to be permanent. But the school deemed them useful enough to keep, named them after some trustees, and called them the Mini Dorms.

There are four of them, though I’m convinced there used to be five. Each holds around fifty students — mostly in single-occupancy rooms, which makes them a commodity — and each has a theme. Much like a birthday party might be pirate-themed, or cowboy-themed, but never both, and that’s the end of it, crying won’t help. Residents must demonstrate that they are involved with the theme, or they are asked to find alternate housing the following semester.

It’s not nearly as lame as it sounds, I swear. Well, Eaton House isn’t, anyway.

Eaton’s the dorm for music, art, theater, and the assorted geeks thereof. That’s where Chris Scarpino had set up shop for the band he was starting. That’s where I was headed after class one afternoon, a week or so after The State showed up to our party, a week or so after Brendan told Chris he should give me a try as his drummer. I’d never been inside the Mini Dorms, and it was strangely reassuring to see that everything was, in fact, small. The room that Chris led me to was barely big enough for the two things in it — a drum kit, and a guitarist.

The guitarist was Chris’ best friend and writing partner, Will Edwards. Will was a laid back counterpoint to Chris’ gregarious energy. He wore glasses tinted just enough to make it hard to see his eyes. With an outback hat perched on his tightly curled hair, the overall effect was not entirely un-Slash-like. He introduced himself in a low drawl, then let Chris do most of the talking.

The drum kit, meanwhile, was a feng shui nightmare. Crammed in the middle of the room between the bed and the desk, the pieces were practically balanced atop one another. Cymbals loomed perilously over the toms, begging to be hit by accident. Chris had borrowed the kit from a friend back home, who couldn’t join the band because he lived too far away. I was something like their third choice. And as I examined this dorm room clown car, it occurred to me that I was about to disappoint them. Alchemy has a way of turning excitement into nerves. Over the course of a few days, what sounds at first like a great idea now sits in the belly, lead that was once gold. One nagging detail was going to ruin this whole thing.

I had never once in my life attempted to play music with other humans.

No seriously, how exactly did Brendan manage to talk me into this?

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