When I was in high school, I was a massive Joe Satriani fan. It was the byproduct of having a couple friends who played guitar - I had (and continue to have) no musical talent to speak of, but I hung out with people that did, and I eventually picked some things up. Though it wasn't my first concert, seeing Satch at The Warfield that spring remains one of the best shows I've had the pleasure of seeing, and this song is a big reason why. It's just straight up fun, and it embodies everything I love about live music. It's all about the give and take between performer and audience, and the call and response verse leading into Satriani's incredible guitar work in the chorus. It's also no coincidence there's what sounds like organ work in there too - it's a song built for stadiums, for hockey games and 4th quarter rallies. It's a song that gets you pumped.
Of course, this being a high school story, it can't be that simple. So I went to the concert - the Super Colossal tour. Loved it, and literally bought the T-Shirt. I wore it to school one day when I was accosted but another student - an acquaintance at best, and definitely not a friend. We'd had a few classes together, and I knew he was a nerd - a music nerd specifically, fond of Primus and Rush. He came up to me and flat out said, "Why are you wearing that shirt? You don't even play guitar, why do you like Joe Satriani?" I was more than a little stunned to be so flatly called out, but more than anything else I didn't have an answer - at least not one he'd listen to. Why does anyone like anything? We just do.
Let me be clear in saying that this isn't some 'mock the dweeb' story, where I look back on the nerdy kid in high school and we all laugh. I'm the last person allowed to cast that stone - to say that I'm a nerd is massive understatement. Instead, this has always been the prime example in my mind of a very dangerous facet of nerd culture; this whole concept of ownership. It's this idea of factionalizing what you enjoy, be it a band or a tv show or a comic. It's 'Us v. Them', applied to pop culture at large, with distinct battle lines drawn. "I like this, so you're not allowed to. You don't appreciate it like I do." Maybe it has something to do with the inherent isolation of nerd-dom, that you don't form many connections so you desperately latch on to the ones you can.
But the whys and hows are less important than the lesson to be taken from this - that ownership of pop culture is an inherently absurd concept. It doesn't matter that you get Joe Satriani's music on a level that's deeper than anyone else, that you know the extended biography of the entire cast of Star Wars, or that David Foster Wallace speaks to you on a level that goes beyond the personal and into the sublime - your dedication does not make that thing any more 'yours', nor does it mean you get to start dictating terms. It all comes down to live and let live, and in this case - live and let rock.
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