hot take but most tumblr (or otherwise online shitposty) “raw lines” aren’t that impressive. i mean some are neat but they’re mostly like aping a specific writing style and theme with varying quality. I could probably write a pretty middling obama story with raw lines if I wanted to
This is what you get when you have the “I’m really smart and articulate and I don’t want to be judged” instinct in combination with the “I don’t actually care about anything” instinct
fair enough, that’s what I deserve for smugposting
that was the real meaning of “I’m really smart and articulate and I don’t want to be judged”
Kurt Cobain is best known (in this country, at least) for his role as guitarist, lead singer, and songwriter for one of the most popular bands of the early 1990s, Nirvana. (It’s possible he was also a songwriter for another band of the same period, Hole, although this claim is controversial.) A lot of people know him from that, especially from his song “Smells Like Teen Spirit” and (to a lesser extent) for his involvement with the “Nevermind” album. (The reason “Nevermind” is such a big name is that it is the most famous Nirvana album, and in particular it is the one with the most famous songs in it.)
ALT
The thing I want to emphasize here is that we’re all familiar with Nirvana because of the songs on the albums by that band. This was not true of people back in 1991, who (according to the internet) didn’t know what Nirvana sounded like. They weren’t aware of any Nirvana recordings; they were aware of this album and the single “Smells Like Teen Spirit.”
The single was released by a “supergroup” called Sub Pop that Kurt Cobain (and others) were part of in 1991 and 1992. At this time Sub Pop was a small but influential label, which released a number of other important indie rock musicians. (I’ve discussed some of these musicians, including Bright Eyes, before, although I have to admit that I’ve heard very little by them compared to the songs and albums they released on Sub Pop.)
The first of these musicians, as it happened, was another future member of Nirvana, called “Father John Misty,” aka Josh Tillman. The first time I ever heard his voice was on this album cover, which was released in 1991, right after “Smells Like Teen Spirit” appeared as a single:
He is one of the only voices on this album cover who is not a Nirvana member, and indeed this is also the first time we see his face. He is portrayed as a kind of mysterious, mythic figure: “The last man to see him, as legend says.” He is also the album cover’s focal point, with the text of the song in the middle.
It’s a really interesting album cover, I would recommend you all listen to it.
I want to talk a bit about the single, which is the album’s most famous song, because it is such a good song, and the one I’ve heard the most. I have in my head many, many times the voice that opens the song.
As I was listening to that song recently, I thought about how Kurt Cobain’s voice in it is really cool, and how a lot of people have commented on this in various ways. To me it is cool that the voice, while having the roughness that most people think of as being associated with Kurt Cobain’s, is very clear and pleasant to listen to, even though it is distorted. I think my favorite detail about it is how the vocal cords start to make a whistling sound that doesn’t seem to fit at first, when the speaker first enters the song.
ALT
As someone with an ear for singing, I noticed this whistling as well as the singer’s voice, and for some reason it really gave the song a strange flavor. I’m not saying it shouldn’t be a part of the song, it’s just interesting to listen to. The whistling gets quieter as it goes along the song; at the end it’s gone.
I remember hearing the single for the first time (I think?) in a gym. When the singer came on to sing the song, it was pretty cool because my gym was pretty much only men who weren’t part of a team, and it was the time of the year before the men’s and women’s basketball tournaments started. (If you remember that far back, the guys in my gym often sang along to songs on the gym’s speaker, and if the speaker is playing anything you can’t ignore it for a while.) The singer came on and sang “Smells Like Teen Spirit” for about a minute, and people at the gym started humming the song.
In fact, one of the few details I have that’s really specific, and that I remember as much as I do, is that the words for the song I first heard this song (I think) at a basketball game were “smell like teen spirit” and not “smells like teen spirit” (or any variation of the latter).
Then I went home and the single became much more popular, and this was a big time for indie rock. (That same year, for example, I heard songs by Bright Eyes and Rilo Kiley for the first time, and before that I had never heard the name of Bright Eyes.) “Smells Like Teen Spirit” is the most famous one, but the other one you may have heard is “In Bloom,” which is an earlier version of this song, also with a cool guitar solo at the beginning.
At the time, Nirvana was on Sub Pop, a label that was releasing the records of many other artists, including this other band called the “Fugazi.” As far as I can remember, they never released anything under their own name on Sub Pop, but I’m sure I could find this out on Wikipedia if I really wanted to. (My vague recollection is that Sub Pop was releasing the albums of the other musicians and they were releasing their own records on other labels. However, it’s also possible that I’m mistaken about this, or I’m confusing Sub Pop with another label, or that I’m mixing up the dates of the release of these songs.)
I mentioned this before, but one other thing I want to talk about is the album itself, called Nevermind. I don’t care much about the album itself as a record. I liked this album, but I didn’t listen to it all that much; it’s kind of a mess. It does not have a clear “sound,” and not every song is enjoyable, although in retrospect some songs were clearly better than others and some are just OK.
Good job, you’ve learned to fake fanmail for clout like a real tumblr celebrity! But you know what gets you even more clout? Fake hatemail! You just have to pretend that someone really mean and unreasonable is sending you hate because you said something that you know your followers agree with. That way everybody will love you.
The whole “we should care about poor people more even if we’re not particularly attached to them personally” debate always gets me.
When I see that sort of thing I feel like it’s this strange combination of “yes, we should definitely help those with lower incomes, this is a good thing” and “but we shouldn’t just help the lowest income people even if we’re not particularly attached to them. Those others are poor because they are morally inferior to us, and they should be kept as far away from us as possible”
“I mean, I’m gay,” says Jack, “I’m not even a little bit straight. You want to know how gay I really am?”
“I’ve got an idea,” says Dave. (He didn’t know about Jack.) Dave tells the story of when he walked into the room.
I’m absolutely enthralled. Please, continue.
Dave tells the story of when he went to school.
“Well, there’s a girl in my math class,” he starts, and a grin spreads across his face. “And she’s so beautiful, Davey, and you know what she does with her hair? Every day she puts little pieces of glitter in it. And she puts sparkly lipstick on. And she does this, Davey. Do you understand what I’m saying? And she’s a math teacher? This is a good woman.”
“I can’t wait to get to know her,” says Dave.
The conversation continues
Jack continues, “So, I mean, you know that guy who came down from the ceiling on a rope? And then he just, like, jumped into the ocean, and everyone thinks he’s dead now? Well, do you know who he is? He’s that guy’s husband.”
I guess it’s all right, since Job just started a book about how unfair God is to him. We’re reading the KJV because that’s the version God used to speak directly to him. We don’t know why God used to speak directly to him (for the same reason the devil is here: because Job sinned in some way) – but if you’re in an argument with someone, sometimes it’s better to read the things they say they believe than to ask them what they meant.
That’s the first thing I had to pick out – I only read the first couple of pages and it was too short to tell what Job meant – but it doesn’t seem obviously wrong, and it’s something I’ve often wondered about.
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