The Heart of Rock and Roll

My very first rock concert was Loverboy, with the opener Huey Lewis and the News.  This was in 1982, at the Fort Wayne Memorial Coliseum, the summer before I went to high school.  Now, to be fair, I wanted to go see KISS for my ninth birthday several years before.  I’m not sure how I came to own the Destroyer album, which was probably my first non-Winnie-the-Pooh record, but I loved “Detroit Rock City,” “King of the Night Time World,” and “Shout It Out Loud.”  My parents convinced me that the concert would be smoky and therefore I wouldn’t enjoy it.  I reluctantly conceded, and consoled myself by listening to Gene and the boys through my headphones, singing aloud with a candlestick as my microphone.  

It always makes me laugh that Huey Lewis opened for Loverboy, who seemingly dropped off the map shortly after that.  My friend and neighbor, Kimberly, was obsessed and introduced our small circle to leather-clad, bandanna-wearing lead singer Mike Reno and the rest of the band.  We even formed our own, all-girl band that played pretend instruments, called The Avenues.  My brother inadvertently provided the name when his own band (that played real instruments, so loudly the neighbors complained) rejected the name Avenue in favor of Angstrom.

Kimberly’s older siblings were also into rock and roll, and so we were listening to Peter Frampton and the Doobie Brothers at a tender age.  I was an adult before I understood what a doobie was, and therefore what the picture inside the Minute by Minute album signified (I thought it was some kind of bug).  I moved pretty quickly from pop-oriented WMEE to WXKE, Rock 104, Fort Wayne’s self-reported Home of Rock and Roll (not to be confused with the heart of rock and roll—more on that later).  I remember singing loudly to Pat Benatar’s “Hell Is for Children” in the car, horrifying my mother.  She didn’t buy that the song was about the problems of child abuse, and I can thank Benatar for having to listen to news or classical music in the car forever after.

When I went back to Fort Wayne last week, I found that Rock 104 is still around, and plays many of the same songs from my youth.  Even Doc, their most popular deejay and arguably the city’s most famous local celebrity, is still on the air.  In fact, I heard a radio ad that he needed a female partner in the morning who knew a lot about music and sports.  I fantasized about being Doc’s sidekick, trading one-liners and insulting callers, and how I would break it to Nels that we had to move back so I could take this part-time gig.  I dismissed it after realizing I just don’t know that much about the local Fort Wayne sports scene. 

That nostalgia trip led to another this weekend as Nels and I visited the Melody Tent on Cape Cod to see Huey Lewis and the News, who were celebrating the 30-year anniversary of their biggest-selling album, Sports.  I never bought that one, but didn’t need to, since it seemed like every song was on the radio.  I wasn’t particularly excited to see this show, as I knew Chris Hayes, the lead guitarist, wasn’t touring with the band any more, but the album was one of Nels’ favorites from high school (he said he and his buddies especially liked “I Want a New Drug.”  Hm.).  On the way to the Cape, we listened to a greatest hits compilation, and reacquainted ourselves with their catalog.  When I tried to explain why I was attracted to Chris Hayes, I talked about his hair that was spiky on the top and long in the back.  Nels asked in disbelief, “You mean a mullet?”  And I had to concede that yes, I was once in love with a guy in a mullet.  Not my proudest moment. 

Despite Hayes’ absence, the show was high-energy and fun.  The Melody Tent was sold out and almost everybody there was our age and knew the words to every song—it was like being at a high school reunion without all the angst.  Many of the band members were original, including the drummer who always wore a vest, and Johnny, the sax player that Huey calls to in their biggest song, “The Heart of Rock and Roll.”  There is not a shred of darkness in Huey Lewis songs, which hearkened back to a more naïve time in my life and is probably the source of their current appeal to other 40-somethings. 

My visit home and shows like these remind me of the importance of music in forming my sense of self and the world.  I used to envy peers whose parents introduced them to the Beatles or Stones, but my friends and I found our own way through our older brothers and sisters.  Yes, we were exposed to illicit—and therefore tantalizing—ideas about drugs and sex through rock and roll, but it was also a safe medium for adolescent longing.  So, if a band from your youth comes to town, check ‘em out, not to be cynical and critical, but to remember the discoveries they offered you.

  

Walter White vs. Francis Underwood

You know that old saying, a couple who watches television together stays together?  Well, I hope that television is not the only predictor of marital harmony.  Just last year, I had to break it to Nels that, after watching the first two episodes of Game of Thrones, the violence against women was more than I could stand.  He would have to watch the rest on his own.  To his credit, he wasn’t surprised by my reaction.  I almost quit watching The Sopranos after the scene where Dr. Melfi gets raped in the stairwell of the parking garage, so he knew I probably wouldn’t last with Thrones, where the carelessness regarding human and animal well-being is at an all-time low. 

However, Nels was surprised when I declined to keep watching House of Cards after three episodes.  His parents recommended it and the critics raved about it, so it seemed an obvious series to obtain from Netflix (to his parents’ credit, they loved The Sopranos and even enjoyed seeing Book of Mormon.  Who knew?).  But after the first disc, I was done.  The writing and acting are excellent, and there is very little physical violence, although Kevin Spacey, in his role as Francis Underwood, Congressman from South Carolina, kills a dog in the first episode.  Ostensibly, it is to stop the dog’s suffering from being hit by a car, or so Francis informs us in a voiceover.  An animal as the first victim of a series—and I’m a cat person, not a dog person—is not a good harbinger.  I get that the scene was symbolic, and perhaps we were to be sympathetic to Francis, but I did not buy it.  Turns out, my misgivings were correct.

It is not as if this is a violent show; at least not in physical terms.  This time, the women, including Francis’ wife, Claire, played by Robin Wright, are as bad as the men, and the violence is of the underhanded, conniving sort.  After three episodes, I could find very little humanity or empathy in any of the characters.  It was another cynical view of what happens in our nation’s capital, like Veep, only without the wink-wink humor (so, actually it’s now three shows that Nels has to watch on his own.  I lasted most of a season on that, but the humor was just too mean-spirited). 

Don’t get me wrong.  I am not completely naïve about the wheelings and dealings that take place in DC.  And two of my current favorite shows, Homeland and The Americans, question the ethics and issues of power among the different agencies and the representatives we elect. (We started watching Scandal, another DC insider tale, too, and I'm still not sure I will stick with it).  It is not so much the story content, but the complexity of the characters that attracts me.  In Homeland and The Americans, we get some backstory.  We understand where the characters come from, and how they came to be.  They are imperfect, make huge mistakes that impact not only themselves, but their families and the country.  But they are written as well-rounded human beings.  I just don’t see the same thing in Veep, in which Julia Louis-Dreyfus acts as if she’s Larry David in drag, and in House of Cards, where there is not one sympathetic character. 

My friend Julie K called me on this when I told her I wasn’t going to watch House of Cards any longer because I found it mean-spirited and cynical.  She said, ”But you love Breaking Bad.  Isn’t Walter White cynical too?”  A fair point.  I am no fan of Walter White.  However, we watched how he evolved into Heisenberg.  We saw how he convinced himself this is what he had to do, even as other options were open to him.  I certainly don’t root for Walter White, although a tiny bit of me cringed when his brother-in-law found the Leaves of Grass book with the telltale inscription.  Walter White is more like Tony Soprano than Francis Underwood.  Flawed, certainly, and ruthless.  Yet, the writers exposed us to their vulnerabilities from the very first episode.  I did not see this with Francis.  I don’t give a crap what happens to Francis, his wife, or anyone else in the show.  I am however, riveted to seeing what happens with Walter.

Usually, I am seduced by good writing.  But right now, I’ll take the lousy writing and overacting in Under the Dome (note to Stephen King:  surely you could have proofed the scripts for terrible dialogue!) over the nastiness of House of Cards.  I know I am in the minority, but there are many well-written shows with empathetic characters that call for my attention.  House of Cards and Game of Thrones can survive without me.