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Adam Schiff, Phish, and Violent Femmes
Back in the mid-’80s I went to summer camp near Monteagle, TN. Every morning we were supposed to be bolted from slumber by “Reveille” blasted through the campus PA system. All it did was make our cabin, a dozen 12- to 14-year-old boys roll over and grunt in annoyance.
What did get us out of bed was our counselor’s boom box turned up to 11 thwanging out the opening bass lines from Violent Femmes’ “Blister in the Sun.” Every kid in my cabin bought the cassette when he got home. I found a Violent Femmes t-shirt, which was no small feat considering there was no online shopping and I was pretty much limited to stores within my there and back before dark biking range. It was fun to know about something cool before it got big. We Camp Mt. Lake kids were ahead of the zeitgeist in a small, hardly noticeable way to anybody who wasn’t 14 and full of himself.
A few years later the band made it to the mainstream and everybody was walking around the halls at school getting the countdown from “Kiss Off” wrong and giving me, Chris, Chris, Joe, and Chris no credit for our early-adopter foresight. I felt deflated, and while I still liked the band, it was years until I picked up the cassette again. Their second album was disappointing anyway.
In December 1990, a friend came back to Birmingham after his first semester at Sewanee. I was still a senior in high school and was wowed by the urbane and sophisticated ways to drink beer quickly that my now college-age friends displayed. They were like patchouli-scented Marco Polos sharing the ways of the world with us preparatory rustics.
The Sewanee guy had a cassette of the album Junta from an unknown band called Phish, and they spelled it Phish! We’d sit around and listen to “Contact” and the one about the antelope running and extol the genius we heard. The following spring or summer, a few of us met the Sewanee guy in Tuscaloosa and saw Phish live in a bar. There were maybe ten people in attendance. We met the band and decided to follow them to Athens, GA, for another show. That night there were 15 people exactly at the show. I know exactly because I went to get a hamburger after and when I got back to the hotel room I paid for, almost every square inch was covered by sleeping concert attendees. Sewanee guy invited everyone back to stay at “our” place. I slept on the bathroom floor.
Obviously, Phish hit it big. They filled stadiums the world over, but like with Violent Femmes, I lost interest when they stopped being my little secret. I wished both bands well and was really happy for them, but something venal in me soured my enjoyment. Also, I was never a hippie. I liked the music and the girls and thought pot smelled like a perfected oregano, but I hated patchouli, have been a lifelong showerer, and had strong opinions on pocket squares that I maintain to this day (stuff a white and only white handkerchief in so what sticks out is just messy enough to make it look like you didn’t fret over it.) Again, I felt like I was snubbed. Where was the credit I was due?
I’m not a Republican or a Libertarian. I float somewhere in the middle, so after most of my friend’s political tirades, I get an “Of course, I’m sure that doesn’t bother you.” Very few in an argument on culture or policy can count on me being squarely in their corner or relied upon to back them up. I’m the fish in your Cocoa Puffs or something. There is one subject on which I’m rock solid: the evil nature of the Democratic Party.
I despise that never-switched organization. Smarmy gaslighting narcissists all, except Bill Bradley who seemed like a nice guy when he wasn’t voting in lock step with Mary Jo’s wannabe Soviet collaborator killer. It’s a really vile club they’ve got there and they will sell you down the river with a smile and a promise to think of the children as the vulnerable future they always talk about investing in without telling you that by “investment” they mean “teach kindergarteners bureaucratically approved instruction on sustainable rectal massage.” There is no perfidy beneath them and membership seems tied to a hollow amnesia that may be the case for the useful foot soldiers, but it’s really just shamelessness hiding behind a veil of false naivety.
Any one of the Democratic higher-ups would be an acceptable focal point for scorn, but for the last few years, I’ve been targeting Adam Schiff. Now that Speaker McCarthy has done nothing but read off a list of the twerp from California’s accomplishments, he’s gone on the offensive, popping up on shows hosted by private citizens he didn’t weasel to have censored, telling us he’s been wronged. I expect that Schiff aversion runs deep on this site considering that those here are more or less self-selecting from the politically informed. So, it’s not from you, gentle reader, that I note the tide of vitriol unleashed on social media against Schiff has lately exploded. It’s cool to point out Schiff’s lies.
Great. But I feel like I’m suddenly at a packed stadium to see Phish or at a party where everyone is mosh-pitting to “The Femmes.” I can tell the newcomers. They still have to hold up a hand to shield their eyes from the glare of that Laminet Deluxe Heavy Duty Crystal-Clear Furniture Cover Schiff had shrink fitted to protect his exposed skin – oleaginous weasel. Welcome to the party and let loose, but remember that I was there responding to every Tweet of his that came across my timeline with some version of “Where is the incontrovertible proof? Were you lying or are you covering for Putin?”
The thing is that I hate name-calling in political discussion. They, and by abridgment Schiff, led me to this. Dammit.
Quick note: It just occurred to me that my summer camp was a ten-minute drive from the Sewanee campus. I don’t listen to either band anymore, but both the Violent Femmes and Phish were a big deal to young music-listening me. Monteagle, TN, influenced my tastes? Weird.
Published in General
This was way, way too good for a Like but it was the only button I could find. I wish I were a hacker.
All of my fellow Ricocheteers know as well as I do how rare it is to find someone who is even cleverer and more profound than oneself.
This Ben Sears guy makes it look like he’s not even trying.
I’d put his screen name on the List if I had the self-discipline and long-term memory to keep a List, and if I could figure out just why I need to know who’s on the List. It’s not as though people like us are going to form a circle, like the Algonquin Club or the French Underground or a Committee of Correspondence, or anything.
Schiff as a member of the House Intelligence Committee was an integral component part to keeping the Russia hoax afloat from one election cycle(2018) to the next(2020).
We now know with incontrovertible certainty that Adam Schiff lied and abused his position of public trust by lying to the world about information which only the Gang of Eight of elected officials had access.
In a just world the MSM would pillory the liar and the voters would boot Schiff out of office.
But in today’s bizarro world the MSM is silent because they too were an additional integral component part to keeping the Russia Hoax on life support ….
….. and the Voters in Schiff’s CA Congressional District have re-elected the internationally infamous liar for a 12th term, and to add insult to injury, Schiff has announced he is running to be the California (D) candidate for the United States Senate, which if he wins the (D) Primary in CA, he will have parlayed his penchant for lying about classified information, getting caught in the monumentally important lie, into a promotion to the US Senate.
The only way the Lefties in Hollywood would turn the incredibly improbable lying Schiff story into a compelling series would be to change the main character into a Republican.
This is assuming California has just and fair elections . This is a laugh out loud idea in the land of perpetual Democrats . I , on the other hand believe . The one who wins the primary is the one the Borg want , not necessarily the one the voters voted for .
How about The Presidents of the United States of America????
(10) The Presidents of the United States of America – kitty – YouTube
Primus?
(10) Primus – Wynona’s Big Brown Beaver – YouTube
I could go on…… Janes Addiction, The Replacements, Dead Milkmen, Porno for Pyros :)
For what it is worth, duly noted. I’ll think of you every time I see his insufferable face.
Yes, yes, yes, yes, and yes to all of these. I was also a Violent Femmes fan back in the ’80s – listening to them was considered avant-garde because of their colorful lyrics and they were not played on the radio. But by the time I was in college, they were played at every house party; the avant-garde became simply “garde” and not as interesting.
I wonder if I dig out my stuff in my parents’ basement I would then find those cassette tapes….
You are very nice to me. Thank you. I’ll be calling my framer now.
Streaming came along just in time to pick up for my aged and scratched copy of Pleased to Meet Me. I could listen to The Replacements all day long.
They hurt you bad and they do it all the time. Sure thing.
I never got into Phish, but I did see Pork Tornado (Jon Fishman’s solo project) in NOLA one fine weekend evening that ended a bit blurry. It was somewhat important for quality of life back then and a treasured evening.
We reached similar conclusions, it seems, with similar headphone emanations, though mine was tied to a countercultural skateboarding phase. I was somewhat hit over the head with the D worship of power, however, while your acquisition seems subtler and therefore much more impressive. Good stuff, loved this post.
@benmsys Phish rules. Come to the ATL shows this summer.
That would be so much fun. I’d be the old guy who doesn’t know any of the new songs. I’m thinking about Todd Snider’s song “Age Like Wine” where he opens with an acknowledgement to the older fans that he’s not going to compare to their memories:
My new stuff is nothing like my old stuff was
And neither one is much when compared to the show
Which will not be as good as some other one you saw
So help me, I know, I know, I know
I should listen to their more recent albums. Those guys are so talented.
Brutal.
Well done.