For a while in high school I had a girlfriend who went to a Catholic school in the bigger town near my hometown. I don't recall entirely the circumstances of our meeting except that a friend-in-common introduced us, surely, because it was suspected we had similar musical tastes. She worked in a bookstore and drove an oddball car, things which further endeared her to me.
Sometime during the Summer between my junior and senior years (her sophomore and junior years), we planned a trip to Omaha to hang around the Old Market during the day and see Omaha bands Acorns and Pioneer Disaster play that evening.
I knew, through Thrasher magazine probably, that Fugazi had a new album out that Summer. I also knew, through the Northeast Nebraska weird kids' grapevine (nice essays on coming of age in that scene, like I did, here) that there were three good record stores in the Old Market where I'd find it. In ascending order of perceived cool factor these were Dirt Cheap, Drastic Plastic, and the Antiquarium. There were more record stores in the area than that--Pickles, probably most notably--incredible as it seems today. We went to the three coolest, in the above order, to kill time before the show.
Each store seemed to have carved out enough of a difference from its competitors that, while there was necessarily some overlap, they existed peacefully, employees even recommending one of the other stores in response to an unfilled request. Dirt Cheap with its 70s head shop vibe carried lots and lots of used records, very few new. Classic rock (loosely construed) in the main, but a sizeable stock of more recent issues as well: 10,000 Maniacs, Midnight Oil, stuff that fell under the old umbrella of 'college rock'. Drastic Plastic toed nearer a metal/industrial line, genres not of particular interest to me though they had plenty of other stuff I was interested in. The man behind the counter was Ritual Device frontman Tim Moss, the in-house music here was the loudest. It was also the place to get your punk t-shirts and patches. Eventually we got to the then-edge of the Old Market where stood The Antiquarium.
For late adolescents of a certain social caste and of that time and place, the feeling upon entering The Antiquarium for the first time of having finally Arrived Home cannot be overdramatized. Part bookstore, part art gallery, part record store, all freakshow hangout, the institution and its denizens were the fully-formed, cosmopolitan realization of the stores we had back in Norfolk. Those were, though beloved (mostly due to their being the only game in town), the imitators, the shadows. This was the real thing. It really was fucking fantastic; top notch at a national level, in retrospect.
Dazed, we made our way through all the floors. We admired at the art together, parting somewhere in the books: me looking for all the VW stuff, Salinger, and Vonnegut I could find, she perusing the Art History section. I don't remember if she accompanied me to check out the records in the basement, where with Dave Sink's help I found the album I was looking for right away, among thousands of others.
Thoroughly dazed, we crossed Harney Street for a late dinner at the Garden Cafe, then ambled through thrift stores and boutiques, past the smells of the world's cuisines and Omaha's homeless to the tavern hosting the show. Now, why would two teenagers from the sticks think they could get into a big city bar at 10:30 pm? It hadn't even crossed our minds that our ages would be an issue; we even dutifully presented our non-fake IDs when prompted by the obviously incredulous bouncer. Having been taken down a notch, we headed for home.
My car lazily ran out of gas right around Westroads Mall. A middle-aged couple helped us out, the man pulling me to the side at one point to impart some friendly words of wisdom vis-a-vis male-female relationships. It seemed that he thought running out of gas was some kind of trick on my part.
LS wasn't entirely into Fugazi so we didn't listen to the album--which I'd bought on cassette--during the drive. Instead it was REM's Out of Time (its cover, interestingly, having similar palette, was then just a few months old). I surely listened to the Fugazi later that night, after my mom freaked about our unexplained late arrival--an offense I'm not sure I've ever entirely forgiven her for, as her flip-out scared the very game girlfriend away,
Best Song
"Latin Roots"
Released
July 2(?) 1991
Acquired or First Heard
It was probably late July, early August.
Next Closest
Gang of Four, I'm told. Aside from MacKaye's signature bark, Fugazi sounds absolutely nothing like Minor Threat, by the way. I don't know why people assume that.
Brush with Greatness (note: may include name-dropping)
I've seen Fugazi five times but never rubbed elbows with them.
No comments:
Post a Comment