"Must I Indeed Learn to Chant the Cold Dirges of the Baffled?"
by Ace Boggess
-Walt Whitman, You That Trembled and Reel'd Beneath Me
I read an online article describing how digital compression is making the younger generation
dimmer, deafer—its singularity maxed out so voice & drum taps sound the same: one note like a
jet engine with rhythm. I also read a book on how the biggest pop songs of the last twenty years
were prefab hits written by Max Martin & his team of math-whiz Swedes, starting with Ace of
Bass & moving through Britney to whomever throats those nonsense words today. Doesn’t every
generation consider the next’s music awful? Aren’t there studies to prove it? I recall a story I
read in my teens about how scientists set up speakers around fields of corn & wheat, blasting the
heavy metal I loved back then, & how the crops yellowed, died—withering, banging their heads
against the ground. Then Grunge made us the laziest rebels of all time, followed by chaotic
alternative music filling us with uncertainties for the coming millennium. Oh, but last month I
read that cranked-up AC/DC has unexplainable benefits as a temporary treatment for
Alzheimer’s. Rock on. What’s my point? I’m not sure I have one, except that I’ve read too much
& would prefer to listen to Pearl Jam, Iron Maiden, or maybe even Britney: something to help
me not overthink like a drug for sleep that keeps me up but stupefied all night.
dimmer, deafer—its singularity maxed out so voice & drum taps sound the same: one note like a
jet engine with rhythm. I also read a book on how the biggest pop songs of the last twenty years
were prefab hits written by Max Martin & his team of math-whiz Swedes, starting with Ace of
Bass & moving through Britney to whomever throats those nonsense words today. Doesn’t every
generation consider the next’s music awful? Aren’t there studies to prove it? I recall a story I
read in my teens about how scientists set up speakers around fields of corn & wheat, blasting the
heavy metal I loved back then, & how the crops yellowed, died—withering, banging their heads
against the ground. Then Grunge made us the laziest rebels of all time, followed by chaotic
alternative music filling us with uncertainties for the coming millennium. Oh, but last month I
read that cranked-up AC/DC has unexplainable benefits as a temporary treatment for
Alzheimer’s. Rock on. What’s my point? I’m not sure I have one, except that I’ve read too much
& would prefer to listen to Pearl Jam, Iron Maiden, or maybe even Britney: something to help
me not overthink like a drug for sleep that keeps me up but stupefied all night.
Ace Boggess is author of four books of poetry, most recently I Have Lost the Art of Dreaming It So (Unsolicited Press, 2018) and Ultra Deep Field (Brick Road, 2017). His writing appears in Notre Dame Review, Rhino, North Dakota Quarterly, Rattle, and many other journals. He received a fellowship from the West Virginia Commission on the Arts and spent five years in a West Virginia prison. He lives in Charleston, West Virginia.
"What can I say about this piece other than that I love music, and I love reading about music as well as the geniuses behind it, even when
those geniuses aren't the ones performing it. You learn some weird things sometimes, and trying to sort out the craziness in my own head
is a sort of music in itself. You know, I read back to back biographies last year about Eric Idle and Eric Clapton, and I was blown away by how George Harrison of the Beatles was such a pivotal figure in both their lives (and thus both books). That sort of odd coincidence fascinates me. As did the many of the things mentioned in this poem."
those geniuses aren't the ones performing it. You learn some weird things sometimes, and trying to sort out the craziness in my own head
is a sort of music in itself. You know, I read back to back biographies last year about Eric Idle and Eric Clapton, and I was blown away by how George Harrison of the Beatles was such a pivotal figure in both their lives (and thus both books). That sort of odd coincidence fascinates me. As did the many of the things mentioned in this poem."
Ace Boggess