Write as you are

[illusionofjoy]

I hate being asked what type of music I like. When asked that inane question, I generally respond with, "good music," much to the consternation of the individual who initially posed the question. This runs counter to what people expect, that being a list of bands or a genre/style. I can't honestly answer with something so narrow as, "I like rock," namely because I've heard a lot of shitty rock music in my time. I've also heard a lot of shitty electronica, hip-hop, classical, baroque and avant-garde in my time too. Conversely, I've heard great songs from each genre as well.

What I really like is when a song speaks to me – on any level. I admit, I've been swept up in stupid pop songs, knowing full well that they were stupid pop songs, because in the three minutes the song played, I felt all happy and stupid and fun. On the other side, I can just as easily get drawn into a 20 minute Pink Floyd tune, just as happy to get lost in the sonic nooks and crannies the band has created.

Leading up to and since the move, I have done nothing of my own musically. It has been nearly three weeks since I've even looked at my keyboard, to say nothing of playing it. The only singing I have done in that time is when I get caught up in someone else's song. I haven't written anything new in nearly a month. The last new piece of music I penned was an angst-ridden little bit about my feelings on weight-loss surgery entitled "Naked & Fading." It was actually the last thing I recorded – sans vocals – before I packed everything up. Here I am, supposedly in the middle of recording a new album, and I'm denying the essential things that would lead to its completion.

I make no money off of my music. In a capitalist society, only the art that people like gets rewarded. I need a day job, but I am forced to wonder if my day job isn't causing my hands to figuratively wither off of my wrists, as a metaphorical noose slowly tightens around my neck. It won't be long before I have no voice at all, I fear. I'll be a dumb old man at the top of a mountain, trying to shout, but issuing only a whisper where no one can hear me anyhow.

The facts are this: I need to drag the fucking keyboard out, set all of my equipment up and get back to making music. I have things in my head that need to get out, but right now I'm just being too damn lazy to let them out.

At its core, The Forever Syndrome is a collection of songs about the same subject I always write about: people. This time I'm just looking at relationships and the idiotic things we do to get into one and then maintain one. People are really fucking stupid when it comes to their love lives, their friendships – ever their acquaintances and professional interactions!

The Forever Syndrome - what does that mean, exactly? I have to admit that I love the title and have wanted to write a set of songs around it for quite some time. It just sounds good to say and as for meaning: nebulous. I can stretch or contract the phrase as I choose. Then again, I always do that when naming albums and choosing which songs go on them. Division is a perfect example of an album title with multiple meanings. I confess: I like to fuck with people.

So, what the fuck does a song about weight loss surgery (or a rant against it, more accurately), have to do with relationships? Well, in of itself, nothing really. It's just a medical procedure (one that I find repugnant, I might add – no, I'm not going to shelter people from my opinions).

The song was inspired by weight loss…or more to the point, women who lose weight because "only a certain proportion of guys are 'chubby chasers' – most aren't. I want to have the best chance possible of finding someone." I shouldn't even need to get into what is wrong with that statement, but I'm going to regardless. First and foremost: changing oneself to please someone else – or the undefined potential someone else – is daft. If one is going to change oneself there is only one person one should change themselves for – themselves! Second, the notion that an idealised (and I use the term loosely) physical appearance is going to land someone a better change at the tastiest fish in the sea is pure bunk. Love is a by-product of physical attraction succumbing to compatible personalities. If some guy doesn't want your fat little heart, he's not going to want your thin little heart. If anything, he probably just wants your thin little body and then is going to move on to the next hole and putter around there until he gets bored and moves again.

Hyperbole is the tool of the trade for an artist, writer or musician trying to make a point. Surgery is the most extreme measure that anyone can take in order to lose weight. That was one reason I based the theme of "Naked & Fading" around WLS.

The other reason I used it as the theme is because I wanted to rail against it, just like I railed against the Bush administration in "Is There Some Way Out of Here?" just as I railed against the war in Iraq in "Hip Hip Hooray" and just as I took a piss on corporate radio conglomerates in "Right Wing Radio." If something pisses me off, I tend to write a song about it. The proliferation of weight-loss surgery pisses me off. I feel like people are being lied to!

I don't know about you, but I don't like being lied to.

Let me get one thing clear right now: as disgusting and repulsive as I find the procedures involved in weight loss surgery, I do not believe they should be banned! One's body should never become the domain of another. I hold self-determination in the highest regard; if someone wants to do something to themselves (and only themselves), no one should stop them from doing it.

So, what the fuck is my issue then? People who want WLS are going to get it, end of story. I should fuck off and let them do what they want, right? Well, yes…but remember that part about people being lied to? Yeah, that teensy little detail two paragraphs up: it seems to me that the whole story about WLS is not being told. These procedures are being sold to a body-obsessed (and culturally manipulated) public as a panacea for all the ills of the so-called "obesity epidemic." I constantly read newspaper articles about people who are so much happier after having the surgery. "I look and feel great," ring out the quotes. If I may interject, dear, you looked better when you were fat.

What I keep seeing pushed under the proverbial carpet are the horror stories of botched surgeries. Am I the only one wondering and taking notice of the fact that more insurance companies are refusing to cover these procedures? The only reasons an insurance company wouldn't cover a procedure that I know of are 1.) It is unnecessary 2.) It is cosmetic in nature or 3.) The risk is far too high. Hello lawsuit.

I have yet to read a newspaper article about a botched surgery. True, these procedures have been refined since they were first conceived in the 70s, but that doesn't mean they are safe, as so much yellow journalism would have you believe (I am particularly pissed off at the Post-Gazette for this slanted reporting – I suspect that UPMC has a hand in that). The horror stories are usually relegated to websites or word-of-mouth cautionary tales.

You won't read about someone's gallbladder rupturing in the newspaper. Nor will you read about someone's oesophagus becoming detached from what was formerly his or her stomach. You also won't get to read about the drastic lifestyle changes that are necessary for this procedure to be successful post-op, assuming it isn't botched. The newspapers seem to conveniently gloss over the body's newfound inability to absorb nutrients properly, and the death camp-like living skeletons that can result from such a condition.

But it's better than being fat, right?

Some people go through this surgery, get the counselling they need and make the lifestyle adjustment just fine. However, more horror stories keep emerging and the refrain, "I should have never done it…" keeps getting louder. People can do what they want with their lives, but I propose that they become damn sure of what they are doing before they decided to do it."

On a less invasive level, this also applies to marriage. "Michelle" has earned a spot as the opening track on The Forever Syndrome. This is a simple three-verse song about a girl getting married for all of the wrong reasons. Now, before I go one, let me preface: I don't believe in marriage. It's just not for me. joi_division and I are quite happy co-habituating in sin and will be for many years to come. Frankly, I enjoy being a sinner. Now, if someone else wants to get married – be it to someone of the same or opposite gender – that's fine by me. I don't care what other people do with their lives, so long as they aren't trying to fuck about with mine. Self-determination, remember? Again, though, with freedom comes responsibility.

Michelle was a girl who I knew solely online throughout high school and my ill-fated college years. She was very flirty and somewhere on my old computer's hard drive, I still have a collection of nude photos of her (no, I'm not sharing – don't bother asking). Often times, she'd tell me of her "adventures" at her college, most of which revolving around whomever she'd slept with that weekend.

One day, she told me that she was engaged. This came as a surprise to me, as I thought she was enjoyed the life without inhibitions. Without saying much about the guy she was engaged to, she asked, "aren't you happy for me?"

"Does it matter," I replied.

"You should be happy for me," she shot back. Why should I be happy for the mere fact that she was engaged? Wasn't she was secure in the fact that she was making the right decision? If she was happy, shouldn't that have been enough? She didn't need my approval. I honestly, didn't care what she did with her life, provided she was content in what she was doing. Michelle didn't see it this way, however.

Denied my glowing approval for a guy whom I'd never met, she tore into me. Several viciously low blows later, I blocked her from contacting me and left her to whither on the vine. In the midst of her tirade, she'd given me a huge list of reasons as to why she was engaged to be married, which made for a lovely Norman Rockwell painting of a suburban Utopia where one could never want for a thing or ever have to worry about being insecure. This list was punctuated by this final item, "…and by the way – I love him!"

That phrase – "…and by the way – I love him!" has stuck with me over the years. I'm not deluded; marriage is not love. Marriage is a societal contract between two people (or more, if you're a Mormon living in Utah), legally declaring their commitment to one another. Love only comes into it if you have a church wedding and exchange vows. If you simply pay for a marriage license and have a justice of the peace provide the ceremony, it has all the romance of signing a lease.

So, I took her name – "Michelle" – and made it into a song. It's a horribly sarcastic song, at that. Yet, there's a large amount of melancholy to it. When I first wrote it, I was pissed off at the girl for being such a twat to me. However, as the years have passed and I've revised the lyrics a bit here and there, it's more of a lament for someone too afraid of being passed up by life and normal society. It's a eulogy for someone living somewhat outside the norms who suddenly became afraid and decided that it was time to "get mainstream or die."

It's got an upbeat tempo that you can dance to, but it's really a sad song. I don't envision it being played at weddings – at least not by people who listen to the words beyond the first line of the first verse.

So, that's a little taste of The Forever Syndrome thus far. I have to say, this has been a difficult album to write – and record. It's still being difficult, despite the speed at which I actually get things done once I do put my mind to it.

It's a very personal album too…so maybe you could forgive me for being crass and belligerent about it. All of my albums are personal to some extent, but this one just seems to cut closer in some ways. The Forever Syndrome is endlessly demanding and endlessly rewarding. I hope the final product turns out as well as I envision it being.

Right now, I'm looking around my room and thinking that it is time to rebuild my studio. It's time to mount my monitor speakers on the wall, set up the keyboard and microphone and open up a vein. I should be back to recording regularly by no later than next week.