by admin
Madonna
On Friday night i had an argument with Justin about what was better: sex or concerts.
To understand the context of this discussion, you need to know a few things about Justin. First, he’s my “one male friend.” I don’t mean this to imply that i don’t consider any other men as close friends, but Justin is my guy friend… the only human being on Earth who you’ll catch me assessing the merits of an ass to, or talking about who i truly think is “hot.” Justin has impeccable taste in music, but it isn’t any of the organic thoughtful music you hear me whine about from day to day, it’s bump’n’grind and rhythm’n’blues with Prince at the helm of his collection as his own version of Garbage or Ani DiFranco. Finally, Justin and i have known each other for a long time, and while we don’t always agree with each other i tend to defend him in conversation just because i get to play advocate to his devil.
So, on Friday night we had taken one too many purity tests and everyone had ingested at least a shot of some sort of Jersey moonshine that came in an unmarked plastic anti-freeze jug, and somehow we started talking about sex and music. I opined that an amazing concert is better than good sex, and that a great song easily outpaces a good orgasm. And, Justin ripped me to shreds. How could i value something audible and intangible over sweaty lusty tangled bodies in heat? How could i rank singing along to a great song higher than getting off?
Two things became rapidly apparent in this conversation. The first was that neither of us were referring to “making love,” but to sex – and that in my book the latter doesn’t really exist without some semblance of the former so “sex” as an act wasn’t even comparable to a really shitty pop concert. The second was that Justin had only ever seen one or two concerts where the performer wasn’t merely reciting their catalogue of songs to the audience. With such incompatible views on sex and concerts, it became obvious within a few minutes that Justin and i were meant to agree to disagree.
Physical attraction is a wonderful thing, but in my world i lust after music. Imported singles make me hot under the collar. Newly announced release dates make my heart skip a beat. Getting good seats at a concert evokes a cry of passion. The day that Izabelle and i charged our Madonna tickets to my credit card my whole world was an excited explosion of joy and rapturous numbness … it was hard to believe i was living rather than dreaming. And, yet, somehow i’m sitting here at my computer and in four hours i’ll be seated inside of the First Union Center, and the lights will go down, and i will suddenly find myself in the same room as Madonna for the first time in over a decade. And, though i’ll be singing along to song after song about physical attraction and lust, i’ll know in my heart that it’s love that matters. And, right now, the love i will have for the woman singing to me from a stage in South Philly is greater than anything i could feel for anyone i’m sharing space, a bed, or body fluids with. When Madonna strums her guitar to open “Candy Perfume Girl,” or when she explodes into the vocals of “Ray of Light,” or when she closes the show with a electronically infused “Holiday,” i will be barely able to catch my breath – those moments will be ones i’ll try to replicate for years without ever being able to put them into words. The experience will be between Madonna and i and thousands of other adoring fans, and we’ll be the only ones who will ever be able to understand.
Maybe one isn’t quantitatively better than the other, but i think each of us is still a virgin with respect to what we’re not defending. And, the same way that making love to someone for the first time must eclipse everything that came before, tonight i’ll be like a virgin again; touched for the very first time.
Unattended business: Lane just gave me another reason to dislike high profile gun-supporting Republicans. It’s not just people that guns kill, you know. Meanwhile, i figure i owe another link to Dane, since i’ve been as-of-yet too lazy to add him to my favourites list. Sooner or later, Dane. Also, Tom added me as a fixture on his sidebar, and in return i used his photo for Uprush’s Netscape-hating Splash page. Tom, you paid me a bigger complement than you might think. While we’re in the complement department, Martha became a sponsor of 25/24, which i still need to record a dozen and a half songs for. Gee, 10 days left… no pressure or anything.
PuppetMaster has lately involved a lot of hitting on Ashley by both Bertie and i … Bertie, you were already Selina’s favourite sBlogger, so we know that when it comes to Ernie‘s webgames the girls like you better than they like me. Thus, i think competing with you for a possibly make-believe barely-legal vegetarian from Vancouver is hardly a fair fight. Also, i got a referral from here, but i don’t know how and i don’t advise you to click through; i can hardly even being to speculate how i got entangled with the Denmark anal lolita scene. I feel all dirty just talking about it.
Finally, now that my beloved and sarcastic co-communication fiend Amy has promised to blog with some regularity, i’m contemplating getting a Philly webloggers ring together – not just bloggers, but webloggers. Phloggers? Dunno… if you’re from the Philly area or go to school here drop me a note about your interest. Just think!, we could have a bi-monthly pub-crawl just like meg, tom, and the rest of the UK crew. And, i’m personally hoping to have CKfieldtrip ’02 be to South by Southwest – which reminds me: field-trip #1 is this Sunday. More excitement about that when i allow myself to contemplate it being only five short days away; if i start thinking about it now all you’ll hear out of me for the remainder of the week is incoherent babbling and squeaks of boundless joy.
Not that that’s entirely different from the current content, i suppose.
So, now that i’m this mean php whiz (just nod your head and smile) this whole domain has become so much more fun to update! No more is the drudgery and hand-coding of tens of the same page over and over just to upload lyrics! Never again do i have to manually add a tab to the AniGuitar Archive! So, yeah. What made me think of that is that i haven’t uploaded lyrics for the oft-played “Up&Down” yet, and i was just reading a recent interview with Melissa Etheridge where she talks about write a breakup record, and she says “So instead of just being like break up and break down, it was more like, “OK, all I’ve got to look at is myself.”
I think that’s sortof the point of the song, in a more roundabout way… it’s not about breaking up and breaking down so much as it is about how all of the things in the song are just the up & down of the relationship and the wake of the relationship and that i finally came to the point where “I’m supposed to be friendly to you” just didn’t make any sense at all. Being friendly to someone is a respect that they earn, not a rule of conduct. So, i’m past the up and down and forced civility and just allowed to be a singular person again.
Also from Ms. Etheridge: “Oh, people don’t know how much I identify with Madonna. I’m a huge Madonna fan.” Rock on, Melissa!