Aging Gracefully

"I used to be 'with it', but then they changed what 'it' was. Now what I'm with isn't 'it', and what's 'it' seems weird and scary." - Abraham Simpson


My mother once told me that we get two opportunities to be cool: once when we are in high school and college, and once when our kids are. Now, I missed out on the opportunity to be cool in high school. I wore corduroy trousers and listened to huge amounts of early Elton John. The closest I came to cool happened because I got a driver's license earlier than most of my friends and could afford to demand fealty of anyone who wanted a ride anywhere. Even the somewhat cool things I did, like star in plays and listen to Weezer, are rooted in pretty damn nerdy places.
I got a little cooler in college. My girlfriend during my senior year of high school bought me my first pair of jeans and my wardrobe improved considerably thereafter. I made the conscious decision to educate myself about this rap music fad that I'd heard about and expanded my zone of expertise from loud white guys to very confident black men. Still, any cool points I might have earned were offset by an innate geek factor that I am quite comfortable with and in no rush to lose. Sometime in 2003, Kel said that I was a mid-30s woman's fantasy with my sensitivity, casual cursing, leather jacket and dog-eared copy of Ulysses. To this day, I have no idea if that was a compliment or not. I have learned that women are not impressed that you know all the words to Paul's Boutique.
Not long ago one of my cousins, who is of junior college age, posted the following as her Facebook status: "Talking Shit About a Pretty Sunset." Because I am a misanthropic asshole, I had assumed that everyone under the age of about 25 had forever lost the ability to care about things that happened more than ten years ago. Yet here was evidence that the kids today were not only exposed to but actively appreciating the very coolest music of my teenage years. I should probably note here that "Talking Shit About a Pretty Sunset" is the chorus of a song with the same name from the first studio album by Modest Mouse. There were a litany of bands in high school that could earn you indie bona fides: Archers of Loaf, Afghan Whigs, The Get-Up Kids, Mogwai, Cursive, Braid, Slint, Hum, even The Appleseed Cast - but everyone more or less agreed that Modest Mouse was the gold standard. Because we were snobby little indie fucktards, we also more or less agreed that This is a Long Drive for Someone With Nothing to Think About, the aforementioned debut album, represented Modest Mouse at their pinnacle, when they were small and pure and ours.
Now that it's 2011, Hum and Slint and Cursive and even Mogwai remain dipped in amber, a sonic reminder of certain houses and turntables and cars and conversations that occurred before consequences and responsibilities curtailed our ability to indulge the idle chatter that shapes the self we will be forevermore. The Get-Up Kids went on a fucking reunion tour last year, playing their first shows in almost a decade. Modest Mouse, on the other hand, sold out to a major label, released three albums, headlined tours, and scored a single, "Float On", that was nearly as ubiquitous as "Jesus Walks" in the summer of 2004.
I'll be 30 at the end of September, which unequivocally ends my eligibility for coolness. I tried to extend my adolescence with grad school and Pitchfork, but I admit that Grampa's truism is beginning to hit home. I've yet to find 'it' scary, but I've found there are very few bands worth all the ink spilled over them these days. Bon Iver is sad and sweet, but that's what Ben Gibbard was originally for, right? Fleet Foxes have pretty harmonies and a dusty Americana, but are they very different from Harvest-era Neil Young? I liked LCD Soundsystem better when they were called New Order. The Decemberists are too clever by half. Panda Bear needs to occasionally program his drum machine faster than 4/4. Cantankerous dismissing of good music through unfavorable comparison with artists of yore is a hallmark of dotage, and while I still listen, I find that fewer things latch on as quickly and/or stubbornly as they did between 1996 and 2004. I wonder when bands are going to again be substantial in their lyrics and muscular in their music, as Modest Mouse were/are.
It is gratifying to know that people younger than I are still enjoying what I inevitably claim as "my" music. Of course, Modest Mouse has a real advantage over all the other indie rock darlings of my adolescence in that they still release material, which stimulates interest in their back catalogue. Also, they're better than any of the other bands from that time, save Radiohead. Quality always wins out in the end.
The truth is that I am not now, nor have I ever been, cool. Miles Davis is cool. Johnny Cash is cool. Sam Cooke is cool. Tom Waits is cool. The Pixies are cool. Modest Mouse is cool. I just was lucky enough to be born at a time when they were all available to me.