the golden age.
Can you imagine what it feels like to play the kind of music you love, music you wrote, in front of thirty thousand people screaming for you? Most folks can, I give you that. But few will ever know. I mean, really know, man. It sounds elitist, in a way, I know. But, really, it’s just a bunch of high school losers, reformed freaks and drug addicts, rebels. We raged against the powers that bind, just like any one of you would. And do. The only difference, though, is we stopped fucking up just long enough to luck out. But you can’t luck out without talent or something they think they can sell. Or both.
I don’t know, man. I can’t help but look back at those days and think it was the golden age or some shit. Before music was packaged and styled and managed. Rock n’roll was still dirty back then. I’m not talking about songs about fucking, either, though many. Or most, actually, were about that very thing. Music back then still had an edge, though. A rawness to it. There was a lot of madness, a lot of beauty in those imperfections, you know? That’s what rock n’roll should be about. That and fucking.
The big companies, that’s what changed everything. Labels bought by big media, sold to conglomerates, that sorta shit. We went from being free, having that sense of freedom, man, to being a cog in the fucking machine, a piece, a product on a production line. The very fucking thing we started off fighting against. The very fucking thing we grew up hating. And it sucks, man, I gotta tell you. Now we just play a few shows a year, for the die hards. Record an album every now and then.
But man, looking at photos like this. It brings me back, I gotta say. How do I feel? I don’t know, man. There’s sort of a sadness there, I’m not gonna lie. For what we were and what we’ve lost. More than that, though? It feels like magic. I feel like magic, like I made magic. But everything changes, you know. Evolves, devolves. However you wanna look at it. And that’s okay, man, you know, because it kinda makes it sweeter. The dirty, the rawness, and magic. The golden age.
Pan Ellington
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