By Brendan Harte Gilsenan

Sophomore year of high school a strange thing occurred. The social system of the student body shifted, and people who never would have been caught dead making eye contact in middle school were now finding common ground. I firmly believe this shift can be credited to classic rock.

What prompted the change was the introduction of 60’s and 70’s music to a portion of the “popular” girls in my grade. This, although never said aloud, yet visually obvious, made these girls feel cool. They would soon be seen sporting their Janis Joplin t-shirts through the hallway, and their Jimi Hendrix button covered school bags. However, it wasn’t really the music that these girls liked. It was the concept of the music that captured their attention. Sure, they thoroughly convinced themselves that they were diehard classic rock fans, but what they really enjoyed was neither the music, nor the musicians. To them, Jim Morrison wasn’t their savior. But thinking he was their savior is what made them feel cool. They liked being perceived as music intellectuals. Even if they won’t admit it, or even realize it, they weren’t into music. They were into the idea of being into music.

There was a time in high school when I tried to get into Jim Morrison’s poetry. I thought it would give me an edge to be one degree cooler than everybody else. ‘How legit is that?’ I subconsciously convinced myself. Screw the music; the poetry is what’s really deep. I wasn’t boasting the fact that I was now more down with the music than everybody else, but I was secretly waiting for people to find out. I eventually realized that I didn’t give a damn about Jim Morrison’s poetry. Hell, I wasn’t even a Doors fan. I quickly gave up the act, and kept on spinning my Weezer albums.

And I still don’t understand why Jim Morrison is viewed as a god of sorts. Was it his ‘deep’ lyrics? Or was it his constant drunken presence that added to his mystique? Perhaps it was his total disregard for proper bathrooms. But, to me, most of that simply makes him out to be nothing more than a dirty, drunken buffoon. Legend has it that Morrison was extremely inebriated while recording the track "Five to One" off of the Doors’ Waiting for the Sun album (and it is quite audibly apparent). It’s stories like this that add to his image. Yet, what perplexes me is that his methods did not deliver a quality recording. Morrison’s vocals are sloppy and out of time.

During their brief run (it’s hard to continue on without a front man), Velvet Revolver would every so often cover "Five To One" live in concert. There are a few bootlegs floating around the Internet depicting the band playing the song how, I believe, it properly should be played: as a tight, concise rock ‘n’ roll tune. Instead, Morrison’s antics distract from the quality of the songwriting on the recorded version.

When Caleb Followill recorded "Cold Desert" for Kings of Leon’s Only By The Night, he only had one verse written. In his drunken stupor he improvised the rest of the lyrics. When it came time to choose a track list for the album, the front man had no recollection of recording the song. In one of the free flowed verses he sang the words “Jesus don’t love me.” Followill, the son of a pastor, claimed it was the saddest thing he had ever said. “I wanted to kick myself in the face for ever saying that… but when I listen to it in the context of the song, all these lyrics… they really, they mean a lot.”

Now that is a story. So why is it then that Caleb Followill will never reach the stardom that Jim Morrison did? Or why won’t Sid Vicious for that matter? Vicious lacked bass skills just as Morrison was not a highly talented vocalist (although the former literally had zero playing ability), and both were equally unpredictable. It is the same reason that Chuck Klosterman feels our list of great presidents and great bands (the Beatles and the Rolling Stones) will never change. “They created the specific criteria for how we classify ‘greatness’”. Morrison set the standard for his lifestyle. How can anyone out-Jim Morrison the man himself? They can’t, and that is why people will continue to praise his music as if sent from God. Because liking his music means liking him. And liking him makes one cool by association.

I am in no way trying to discredit the Doors, or the influence they have had on music over the years. I understand that they are historically a very important band. But I also understand that these girls found the Doors, and other musical acts, important for all the wrong reasons.

When Weezer fans first learned that Rivers Cuomo was seriously into Top 40 radio they were heated with the awkward, squirrely man. They could not fathom how the songwriter behind 1996’s raw, emotional, and brutally honest Pinkerton could possibly adore music from manufactured Disney queens, such as Miley Cyrus, about crushing on boys and listening to Britney Spears on the radio. At first I was puzzled as well. Yet, I soon realized that Rivers got it right. He does not find profound merit in this music, nor does he care to. He appreciates it for what it is, and that’s what pop music is all about. Flipping on the Top 40 does not make Cuomo feel smarter, or cooler than the average music listener. It simply entertains him. He likes how the songs are constructed and how they sound. Nobody is arguing that Miley Cyrus is an infatuating and deeply mysterious musician. But her songs will get stuck in your head. And Rivers most certainly does not like Lil’ Wayne for his life antics. He simply finds it fascinating that the rapper “rhymes turtles with turtles, which is crazy!”

Thanks to Rivers, I now know I don’t have to take all music as seriously as I once did. I can listen to Lady Gaga’s "Bad Romance" and truly enjoy it. It is undeniably catchy, and shows how proficient of a songwriter Lady Gaga is. By not taking itself too seriously, “Bad Romance” succeeds at being more important of a song than those that take themselves too seriously, and consciously try to be important (or rather, are proclaimed important by their pretentious listeners). I can enjoy music without requiring the need to analyze it.

Take Cheap Trick, an extremely important and influential band, for example. They’re about as close to pop as any classic rock station is willing to play (aside from their earlier material – I’m including the rerecorded In Color here -, which is really more punk than anything). Rick Nielson never set out to be the next John Lennon - unless he had Meet The Beatles in mind. Yet, Cheap Trick has stood the test of time. I never saw a single girl in high school dawn a Cheap Trick shirt. This is because it isn’t cool to listen to Cheap Trick. The band never adopted a reputation badass enough for my generation to feel cool sporting their apparel. I’m fairly sure I was the only member of my student body who owned, and wore, one of their shirts. This was because I actually enjoyed the band for their music (and they’re a pretty stellar live act, too).

The thing about Rivers Cuomo, is that he was raised by hippies. He was raised in a household that girls from my high school wish they had been raised in. By default, he is closer to being a real hippie than a Woodstock shirt and an abundance of quoted Simon and Garfunkel songs will ever make these girls out to be.

I have come to learn that my college friend, Kat, is everything faux hippies pretend to be yet nothing like what they actually are. She has the shirts and she is into the music, but she is also genuinely concerned about the Earth, peace, and love. She is the only person I know who recycles every ounce of plastic, and every shred of paper. She donates money to Africa, and volunteers her time helping with social work. And she is a diehard Trevor Hall fan. And Trevor Hall doesn’t smoke weed. Why is this important? Because Bob Marley smoked a lot of it. Hall’s music shares many common themes with typical reggae music. He sings about peace, love, nature, and spirituality. But he does not smoke weed. This instantly makes Hall’s music more credible than that of artists who force importance upon their own music.

Growing up I often wished I was either Rivers Cuomo or Bruce Springsteen, just as the girls from high school had wished they were real hippies. If Trevor Hall had wanted to be his idols just as I had wanted to be mine, he would undoubtedly smoke weed. Instead, he uses reggae as an influence to make music that is truly his own, rather than a cheap copy of something that has already been done. This shows that he has adopted both his life and musical styles based on what reggae music truly is all about. He cares about the peace, the passion and the love behind his music, not the credibility it garners him to successfully pull off a Rastafarian look. He is not trying to be Bob Marley.

Trevor Hall is still a fairly unknown artist. Therefore, a person is not viewed one way or another for being a fan of his music. Kat isn’t trying to project a certain image of herself into the eyes of other people. She just genuinely is a modern day hippie.

And this is why I don’t trust most hipsters. It appears to me that they are actively trying to be hipsters. They all seem to share a cookie cut mold of common interests. These include a fascination with being pop-culturally literate, and the need to understand which music is legit, and which is not. They always seem to “get it”, when often there really isn’t anything to get at all, except for what they make ‘it’ out to be while claiming to “get it” in the first place. I have this hunch that many hipsters convince themselves (either subconsciously or not) to like certain elements of pop culture so that they can be sure to fit the mold of what they believe being a hipster is all about. While they believe they are forming their own ideas about the world’s least discussed, yet most important, topics, they are instead surfing the same wave as all other hipsters. And I can’t trust anyone who is unable to form his own opinions.

The only hipster that I know (although not personally) whom I can find merit in is Chuck Klosterman. He does not ask you to trust him. At times he even specifically tells you not to. His ideas are often so complicated, and contradictory, that in the end they very well may have voided themselves. And this is why I do trust him. He consciously knows this about himself, and accepts that he is in no position to impress his opinions upon the reader. He is simply speaking his mind. Klosterman is also a self-proclaimed metal head, which proves that he is not actively trying to be cool (being that metal is a very dated genre which is currently viewed as uncool. Not the ironic type of ‘uncool’ which in reality makes hipsters feel completely cool, like being a Star Wars fan). His goal is not to be a hipster, like it is for so many. He just is one.

Before, I criticized hipsters for claiming to understand what music is universally all about. I suppose this is in fact exactly what I’ve spent a large portion of the past 2000 or so words doing. Perhaps I’m a bit of a hipster myself. In that case, I guess I’ve already warned you not to trust anything that I’ve said (Which should be obvious. These are simply my opinions – that’s stated right in the title). Would it build my credibility if I pulled a Chuck, and specifically told you not to trust anything I’ve just said (some reverse psychology, perhaps)? Maybe. But probably not.

But, hey. Think about it.