FEAR: The Blog

The other night, a little drunk with Sarabird, I wanted to play her Scott Walker, only I couldn't find it in my many boxes of random journals, cd's, and cassettes from the past 15 years, but I did find, of all things, a cassette of "Fear: The Record."

I put that on instead (funny how you can switch moods from Scott Walker to Fear under the right conditions), amazed that it still played, and amazed at how great it still is to these jaded ears. I love Lee Ving's voice. It's like if you took the average drunkass Philadelphia Eagles fan and gave him opera lessons. That's the sound you'd get, this drunk guy howling. I wish somebody in a band around here sang like him, and I wish somebody played guitar solos like Philo, that detuned whammy bar anti-taste.

I first heard FEAR like a lot of people, in that masterpiece of exploitation, "The Decline of Western Civilization." I brought it over to Dave's house and we watched in his room, laughing hysterically at the subtitles accompanying the Germs. The bands were pretty good--nothing I was completely enamored with at the time--but then FEAR came on, and all those wonderfully ridiculous one-liners that enamored them to John Belushi. After 10 minutes of it in the movie, Dave and I just wanted them to shut up and play a song already.

Then they were off, and we were way into it. I bought the tape at the Peaches on State Road 434. Played the shit out of it, like a lot of punk bands at the time. They didn't really do enough to be much of an influence, but their 4 or 5 great songs are truly legendary, and when I hear them, especially after not hearing them for quite awhile, I laugh a lot and am thoroughly entertained. For example, I really crack up over the line " New York's alright if you like art and jazz," and the way Lee Ving's yankee snottiness comes out in the words "art" and "jazz," like the only thing worse than liking art and jazz is being gay.

And this brings me to the problem with that damn google. I googled up Lee Ving, and ended up reading this interesting interview with Spit Stix, Fear's drummer. (I'm too lazy to include it has a link, so just go ahead and google up "Lee Ving" your own self, and you'll find it on the first page.) It was interesting, but it kinda shattered some illuisions I wanted to believe in.

For example, in "The Decline..." I wanted to believe that that punk girl who kinda looks like Carol Burnett really really hated Fear and their fagbaiting. No. Turns out, she was a friend of the bands. There was also talk of Mr. Ving playing in a country rock band right before he was in FEAR. I didn't need to know that. Shit. Lee was actually very right-wing, sez Mr. Stix. Not that I care about that all that much, and it certainly doesn't denigrate the music, but I wanted to believe all that fagbaiting and audience rage was designed to just really piss everybody off. It was, but goddammit, he was sincere?!? Sincerity is overrated. Obliqueness shows real creativity.

The problem with google is that too much of it tells you more than you really need to know. Picture that annoying co-worker by the water cooler sticking out her hand and saying, "Too much information." People need myths and legends. Who cares if they're true or not. We need to believe them so we're inspired to do something similar.

Sometimes, I prefer reading about bands before actually hearing them. I think that's how a lot of kids actually first heard punk in the 1970's. That means you have to use your imagination. That's why the Killed by Death comps are so stupid and weird and unique. Nobody knew what this shit sounded like yet. The codification of the 80's hadn't happened yet. You actually had to make some kind of effort to seek out bands, whether it was going to shows, underground record stores, college radio, whatever. Now, it's easy. Almost too easy. It's great that you can find bands now so easily on the internet, it's just that the double-edged sword of it is that the imgaination and individuality may suffer. One of the few things I miss about living in Orlando was the ability to create in a near-total void. You didn't have 60 people passing judgment on what you were doing. You were allowed room to breathe, to create on your own terms without a bunch of idiots looking over your shoulder.

I'm not advocating a return to the days before internet. It's just that sometimes you're better off not knowing that there was a left-wing (Derf and Philo)/right-wing (Lee) dichotomy to FEAR, or that these guys did anything else that wasn't punk-punk punk rocking.

That being said, youse a buncha jerkoffs, eat my fuck assholes, and next time--don't bite so hard when I cum, and I'll see you in Frisco while they're installin the hottub.