George W High Voltage

Dear Reader - this will not be political. Pinky promise. However, it might (editor: it doesn’t really get political)

I am 38 years old. I was born in 1987.  I was 14 when 9/11 happened. I was a senior in college when the financial collapse of 2009 happened. I was 33 years old in 2020. Every generation has their moments. Their milestones. Their defining cultural “things” - feels like mine has had 3 (and probably more), but those three stand out. 

I recently listened to six episodes of The Big Picture which highlighted 12 movies from 2000-2010 that all highlight different feelings of the aughts. Responses to 9/11. Responses to the Bush administration. Responses to Obama. All the highs. All the lows. It really took me back how it felt in high school and college. As an adult, you sit back and wonder what our kids are going to live through. What cultural things are going to impact them? Will they be living in Mad Max times by the time they are 38? What’s gonna happen? So it’s funny… not sure funny is the right term… but it’s funny to sit back and think about how much culture has changed in the 25 years since Y2K. 

The difference between Bush and our current Republican president. The difference in how movies are made. What type of humor is acceptable. How music is consumed. I have two CDs in my car (I need to get more) One - Take Off Your Pants and Jacket. Two - Satellite. It’s not in my car but another example of an early 2000 CD I had… Star Fish and The Hot Dog Flavored Water. We needed a friend’s mom to buy us Star Fish. I bought Pants and Jacket at Hot Topic and we were expecting to have our purchase rejected cause we were too young. Satellite…. Midnight release at the Hazard Center Warehouse in Mission Valley (thanks for taking us, dad). Back then, young folks, you had to go to a store to buy an album. Or send money in the mail and hope you got something in return. Now it just pops up on your phone at 9PM PST (on Spotify, not in the intrusive U2 way…). Movies have changed a bunch now too. We get super hero junk and weird IP attempts. At our Monday night band nights, we recently watched Crank 2 (2007). They really don’t make them like this anymore. Wild movie, btw. I recent trend is watch sequels to Jason Statham movies without watching the original. Mechanic 2. Crank 2. My FAVORITE thing we did recently - we made Johnny watch the 4 hour Snyder cut of Justice League. He went in blind, having not watched any of the other Snyder DCEU movies. It was torture.

Back to the plot…

On September 12, we have a new song coming out. It’s called “Forever Remember.” I’m often shocked by how life connects. Hear me out - I’ve had this song title in mind for a while. Forever Remember The Undertaking! Something to eulogize us if we ever quit making music. This isn’t the final song*** by any means, but it’s a fun title. Forever Remember… technically releases on 9/11 here in San Diego. That wasn’t intentional. This release date was simply planned six weeks after “If You’re So Rich, Why Aren’t You Smart?” But isn’t that kinda odd?

The song is my Screwtape Letters. A reminder to never forget who we were and what made us the way we are… and a warning, I guess cause in the song I say “something was bound to go terribly wrong” and “this is hell and I believe it will get worse than this” hahahahah. And you thought I was gonna write a happy song? 

(editors note - I was going to add a hype clip from the song here, but beehiv won’t let me embed videos… brb)

Never Forget. Forever Remember. Mission Accomplished. The 2000s were weird. The 2020s are weird. We ever gonna get an era that isn’t weird? Hopefully but I believe it will get worse than this….

MOVIES - I watched The Hateful Eight last week and it still ranks pretty low on my QT list. Such a grueling hang. I watched The Monkey which I liked more than I was expecting based on the reviews. Funny. Quirky. I’m liking these Perkins movies. 

Enjoy your week. Come back next week and maybe we can talk about us winning the Furnace Fest competition a couple years ago and the pros and cons of that. 

***you’ll know it’s our final song when it’s called “The Final Undertaking.” Spoiler alert.

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