The Sun Also Does That Thing

Sitting in the bathroom at Sun Studio in Memphis, Tennessee, I had the rather crude realization that Elvis Presley had most likely used it just before his first recording session while, just across town - at Graceland, where I'd be heading next - was the toilet that he had died on -- though I wouldn't be allowed to see it, let alone use it. These are small progressions, but we deal.

At any rate, there was some label copy on the wall about the famed studio being the "birthplace of rock" or something like that. What it means, essentially, is that - for a brief moment - Sun Studio was ground zero. The best music promises something more than music. It holds the promise of changing the world around it in a complete and total way, one that comes through on a recording each time it is played. Elvis's Sun Sessions do that, as do countless other pieces: "Nevermind The Bollocks... Here's The Sex Pistols", Talking Heads' Once In A Lifetime, Patti Smith's rendition of Gloria...

On the way over to Graceland, like last time, we listened to Paul Simon's album of the same name -- a cheesy thing to do, no doubt, but still utterly necessary. The album, though undeniably lite in a few aspects, also contains a certain power. It embodies a complete aestethic which grabs the 1986 New York aging hippie set in a perfect frozen moment. As a slice of that, one can think of all of the possibilities spread out before it. Though his ultimate influence on the outcome is debatable, Simon's work with the South African musical troupe Ladysmith Black Mambazo undoubtedly raised public awareness of apartheid.

If that raises the stakes of "Graceland" (and "Rhythm Of The Saints"), does it diminish the power of "Nevermind The Bollocks..." to know that within two years of its recording, Sid Vicious would be dead of a heroin overdose in New York while the conservatives would still be command in the U.K.? By some standards, Paul Simon succeeded and Johnny Rotten failed. Does that do anything to the music? Is it possible for a record to realistically make the promise of change in the world outside the stereo? In what ways can music actually change the world?

On a mass scale, it's probably impossible. And that's probably a good thing. One should be suspicious of anything that purports to effect a wide audience. On a personal level, though, it is more than possible -- and who can really experience art on greater than a personal level?

The single most powerful force I have ever experienced is music -- specifically the Disco Biscuits' spontaneous score to "Akira" on December 31, 1999 at the Theater of the Living Arts in Philadelphia. For the duration of set, I felt a sense of perfection. Nothing needed to be changed. It felt like an end of sorts. (And it was, but that's too literal a path to pursue right now.) At any rate, it felt like something had been achieved. And, again, it was. But what does that mean? Where does one go from there? What does one do the next day?

When the music ends, the feeling of impending explosion usually does too. One solution would involve going back for more, like a drug -- a solution that certainly many go for. The music is the end. Another would be to study the feeling of wonderment contained in the music. What causes it? Can one apply it isomorphically to his daily routine?

"Nevermind The Bollocks..." is clearly a more exciting album than "Graceland". It is more through its exuberance than its raw power that it provides an answer to the question: while perhaps the punk movement was spawned by political turmoil in England, Malcolm McLaren's wish to make a quick buck, etc., all that's really left is the record. As such, it becomes a paradox: because the music is so powerful, it gives the listener the sense of the inevitable and immediate destruction of the current order such that the listener need not act himself. Where the album might be a call for anarchy (however superficial that call might be), it seems too complete. Too much is promised.

Naturally powerful music presents a paradox of self-limitation. If "Nevermind The Bollocks..." truly incited people to anarchy, if one gets out of the record what it is implied he is supposed to, then no one would ever make it to the end of the disc because they'd be out blowing shit up. It would seem that music would contain a built-in mechanism that keeps listeners listening, somewhat akin to what keeps people watching television between commercials. But that's just ridiculous.

Almost a quarter century after "Nevermind The Bollocks..." release, any revolutions that it might've started have long since dissipated. The album is bereft of its powers, at least on that level. In that sense, it also answers an implied question: why do we bother with new music? Why not content ourselves with the classics? Certainly, enough great music has been recorded over the past century to warrant a lifetime of study. Yet, something keeps us driven to look for records by new artists. New music has a sense of an incomplete mission and still contains the possibility of change.

Jesse Jarnow is stuck inside of Biggs with the Studio 77 blues again.