Gretchen Goes To Nebraska - King's X (1989)
A week of kings: I spun up my randomizer and randomly got 3 different artists with “King” in their names. So I’ve expanded it to a whole week
OK here’s a thing that occurred to me, take or leave it. I’m not sure if I believe it but I might:
The entire trajectory of my life, my inability to conform to how normal people are supposed to act, my inability to just accept that sometimes things didn’t make sense, my troubles with connecting to something larger than myself, but my simultaneous yearning for it, are crystalized in King’s X’s Over My Head
chunky riff -> chunky riff -> BIG GAUDY DISSONANT FUCKING JAZZ CHORD -> back to the riff
the lyrics: “I hear it so clear / I hear it so dear / I know I’m not crazy”
So anyway, here’s a little record that was low-key life-changing for me in 1989. Music could be loud and defiant without being ugly or hyper-masculine or blustery or walled off from “normal” music.
I didn’t have the knowledge or resources to launch from this into progressive music, even though it would have really appealed to me at this age. But it was a touchpoint into something smart, sophisticated, and emotional that sits as a bookmark for things I’d eventually learn to love about my musical taste and (probably, maybe, eventually) love about myself.
Singer/bassist Doug Pinnick is a character who’s always fascinated me. First, before I knew anything about him, because his tall and thin figure accentuates the fact that he has longer arms than any human should have, and he had a bitchin’ hairdo at the time I first encountered him.
I have learned since about his struggle squaring his fundamentalist upbringing with his homosexuality that pushed him both out of his faith and out of the Christian music biz. It’s a sad story that ultimately ends with his self-acceptance, and I’m here for it.
Tracks I Liked
Over My Head - obviously.
Everybody Knows A Little Bit Of Something - another hard-rockin’ cut, this time an erudite examination of how to disagree
Pleiades - what I would find eventually to be the sort of classic prog style, but didn’t recognize as such at the time I first heard it. I just knew it was captivating.
