Flaming Pablum

Welcome Back to The Pleasuredome

Last night was my 36th high school reunion. Technically, the proper milestone would have been *last* year (35th, as we all love tidy increments of five), but because of COVID, that was reduced, last year, to a chaotic zoom call. But probably because COVID is still with us (thanks to the willfully ignorant and vax-reluctant), this 36th wasn’t quite as robustly attended as it might’ve otherwise been. Still, as my son now goes to the same school (and was giving tours to crotchety alumni), I felt obligated to go. Plus, y’know … open bar. Who am I to turn my nose up at that?

In any case, given my heartily cultivated neuroses, I, of course, arrived bang on time. This is a long-standing problem. Throughout my teens and twenties, I used to arrive at parties at the specified times, only to hear the sound of hairdryers still blowing behind front doors, prompting the necessity to walk around the block three or four times before making a more well-timed, fashionably tardy entrance. Not wanting to (still) be that guy, I decided to take a leisurely stroll around the surrounding environs before making the scene, so to speak. To score said stroll, I selected an album that was period-specific to my high school years, that being Welcome To The Pleasuredome by ye olde Frankie Goes To Hollywood.

While ambling south down Fifth Avenue, beneath the magisterial edifice of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, I realized I probably hadn’t listened to this record in any real capacity in decades. Richly over-the-top and somewhat ridiculously overproduced (thanks, I believe, to former Buggle/Yes knob-twiddler Trevor Horn) Welcome To The Pleasuredome is a sumptuous and suitably audacious affair, but still kinda completely rocks (that bass!) Heard through the prism of 2021, where songs like “WAP” and “Pu$$y Fairy” win prestigious industry accolades, “Relax” *still* manages to sound uproariously un-nuanced and strenuously inappropriate in its espousal of indiscriminate ejaculation. “Two Tribes” hasn’t aged quite so well, and suffers from a bit of frowny heavy-handedness, considering the libidinous reverie of the rest of the album. But it still has that bass to recommend it, unlike “The Power of Love,” which remains po-faced and ponderous. Who decided to put an earnest Christmas carol on an album otherwise preoccupied with carnal gratification? There are also the covers — The Temptations’ “War” and a cheeky swish through Springsteen’s “Born to Run” — but neither threaten the main attractions here.

For me, though, the real revelation was the title track, a sprawling, thirteen plus minute suite, veering from the wide-screen audio depiction of a verdant garden of abundance into a driving, bass-driven odyssey ripe with lush and surprising sounds and instrumentation -- washes of space-age synthesizers, periodic bursts of clangy guitars, Morricone-cribbed “HOO HAH” chants and even a chugging harmonica subtly buried in the mix. The lyrics may not be the band’s finest work (“there goes a supernova … what a pushover!”), but Frankie never claimed to be profound.

As a single piece of music, the suite of “Welcome to the Pleasuredome” is practically as expansive and cinematic as latter-era Pink Floyd, albeit the horniest and gayest Pink Floyd you could ever hope to hear. That aspect really cannot be overstated, though. I would have been a high school junior upon first hearing the whole Welcome to the Pleasuredome album and otherwise slavishly devoted to laughably hyper-masculine punk, hardcore and heavy metal records. While just shy of any brazen bluntness (Holly Johnson’s zealous pronunciation of the present-tense verb/descriptor, “ERECT” while quoting Coleridge notwithstanding), Frankie Goes to Hollywood’s debut opus was still such a proudly in-your-face celebration of myriad facets of human sexuality. As a result, it felt a thousand times more taboo and dangerous than anything Suicidal Tendencies or Iron Maiden could ever hope to offer.

Even as the pimply and introverted geek that I was, I indeed knew what this album was all about. Much like “Love My Way” by the Psychedelic Furs, it duly fired my imagination about the mysterious realms of intimate physical interaction (a realm I would still be some years away from attaining, not for any lack of trying). It didn’t matter to me that these songs were almost certainly about gay sex — they were about sex, and performed in a manner that addressed the subject in a comparatively more welcoming, healthier and more relatable way than as handled on, say, Shout at the Devil by Motley Crue or Fair Warning by Van Halen, where sexual scenarios were invariably more predatory than celebratory. These songs, like the afore-cited “Love My Way” before them, scored many a fantasy of dancefloor and boudoir escapades with various ladies from my high school who shall remain forever nameless. While those ornate dreams were ultimately never realized, they still vividly exist in three-dimensional technicolor within the grooves of Welcome to The Pleasuredome.

How is this record regarded today? As far as I know, it hasn’t been feted with any critical reappraisal. No one’s penned a 331/3 edition about it (like Annie Zaleski’s excellent recent one on Rio by Duran Duran). ls it perceived as too empty, arch, affected or topically irresponsible? Is it marred by its proudly lavish production? I don’t quite understand it

As the title track came to its preposterous signature climax with Holly Johnson’s campy cackle roaring through my headphones, I glanced at my watch. It was time. I stepped inside my former high school with the impossibly bacchanalian strains of Welcome to the Pleasuredome still ringing in my ears to re-join the ranks of my now middle-aged classmates to reconvene and reminisce.

Back to School: A Playlist

Surreally enough, my daughter is now a senior in high school. This means that our lives are currently ruled by the looming prospect of college. Our downtime is largely spent discussing the finer points of the application process, unspooling that tangled ball of red tape that is financial aid and visiting as many college campuses on my daughter’s list of “Likelies,” “Targets” and “Reaches” that we can get to. To say that this is an intimidating process is a herculean understatement.

This coming weekend, the four of us (we’re bringing Charlotte’s little brother Oliver along, as he’ll be in this same position before we know it) to go visit my alma mater, Denison University out in Central Ohio. We made the plan some months ago after the school reached out to my daughter about her fencing. In a strange coincidence, the weekend we planned to visit also turned out to be my reunion weekend. Being that I was already going to be there, how could I NOT go to that? It was turning out to be quite a point on my calendar to look forward to.

But, as fate would have it, much like the Devo show I was all excited about last night, my reunion ended up getting cancelled over COVID-19 concerns.

We’re still going, of course. Actually, the more I think about it, it’s probably for the best. We can now focus on my daughter’s visit and keep our eyes on the prize, so to speak. I’ll still get to wander around the campus and probably freak out.

In any case, while I don’t normally use Spotify, for the purposes of beefing up this post, I made a needlessly sprawling playlist of the music I concerned myself with during my four years at Denison as a gormless, chicken-chested college dork. Enjoy.

For Those Not About To Rock ... Redux

About five days ago, there were reports that in the wake of a music festival on Randall’s Island – something called Electric Zoo – a cluster of at least 16 confirmed cases of COVID-19 had surfaced, and attendees were being advised to go get tested immediately, regardless of their vaccination status. This event happened outside and was attended by tens of thousands of people with deplorably bad taste in music EDM fans. According to the festival’s official website, attendees had to provide proof of vaccination or a negative COVID-19 test before they would be allowed to enter. Those with neither had the option of taking an on-site test (for a tidy $99.00). It had appeared that the organizers were being responsible, proactive, were all buttoned up and ready to … uhh …rock (well, not really).

But, alas, not so.

As weepily reported yesterday, my beloved DEVO – despite having themselves played the Riot Festival in Chicago just last weekend – cancelled their grand return to Radio City Music Hall this evening over COVID-19 concerns, although bitter rumors persist that it was more about poor ticket sales. People are also actually wagering as to whether this coming weekend’s Governors Ball -- another Lollapalooza-styled annual music festival also on Randall’s Island -- will get a similar last-minute plug-pulling.

If you go to the official websites of both Radio City Music Hall and the Governors Ball, both operations plainly lay out their COVID-19 protocols, just as the organizers of the Electric Zoo did.

While I’m still super bummed about the DEVO postponement/cancellation (the band is saying they’ll reschedule, but Ticketmaster are already saying I’m getting a refund), there was another gig I was planning on going to tomorrow night, that being Lydia Lunch’s Retrovirus at St. Vitus in Brooklyn.

Neither a stately, art-decco Manhattan institution nor an airy, outdoor festival ground, St. Vitus is a comparatively intimate, grotty rock club. Its walls are painted black and it has no windows. It plays host to an endearingly unsavory amalgam of heavy metal, punk, industrial and gratuitous noise rock. In other words, it’s fucking perfect. I’ve seen a handful of shows within its forbidding confines, and I’ve always had a fucking marvelous time.

But while entirely unlike the other concerns invoked in this post in every conceivable fashion, St. Vitus also has a proactive and starkly worded COVID-19 policy, just like Radio City Music Hall, Governors Ball and Electric Zoo. If you want to darken the already-dark doors of St. Vitus, you have to observe the protocol – proof of full vaccination in order to gain entry. It’s reassuringly worded and suggests a heightened awareness that this struggle is about the collective, not the individual.

Regardless, I’ve decided that I’m not going.

I wrestled with it for a bit, but in the grand scheme of things, it just doesn’t seem prudent. As has been alluded to in the graphs above, even the best-laid plans and intentions have gotten this wrong. While I may be encouraged by St. Vitus’ precautions and would be super keyed-up to see Retrovirus play, I regret to say that it’s just not worth the risk for me, right now. This will actually be the second show at St. Vitus I’ll be opting out of since the arrival of the pandemic, the first being Human Impact’s gig there in March of 2020, which I wrote about here. That performance indeed happened, but was an odd evening out, by all reports.

Look, everyone has their own comfort level with this situation. I don’t mean to dissuade anyone from going, nor am I shaming the venue for hosting the event nor the band from performing. Given my responsibilities and schedule of activities, it just doesn’t seem like the right move for me to make at this time. If you want to go, by all means do and have a great fucking time.

While I’m absolutely always game to see Lydia Lunch speak/read/perform/castigate in any permutation, I am especially bummed to be missing this particular iteration of Retrovirus, which features Sonic Youth/Pussy Galore/Bewitched drummer Bob Bert, rock-solid bassist Tim Dahl and explosive guitarist Weasel Walter of the Flying Luttenbachers. Flanked by these accomplished players, Lydia delves into her sprawling back catalog to reinterpret old works with strenuously muscular results. It’s damn hard to imagine ANYone being able to upstage Lydia Lunch, but Weasel Walter comes really damn close in the clip below. These motherfuckers can really play.

Here’s hoping they’ll be back.

ADDENDUM: For those of you, like myself, who opted out of attending last night's Retrovirus show (for whatever reason), they've since hosted the whole thing on YouTube. Enjoy ....

Jerked Back N’ Forth: Devo at Radio City Gets Nixed

The road to get to this one was long and fraught, but the outcome could have probably been predicted.

Upon first learning that DEVO were returning to Radio City Music Hall for the first time in 40 (!!!) years, I immediately purchased tickets. You have to remember, this was in, what, May? At the time, hopes and expectations were skyrocketing. People here in New York City were getting their second vaccination shots. A long, miserable winter under the dark cloud of COVID-19 seemed to be abating. People were making plans again. Things were opening up.

From the get-go, however, this event seemed star-crossed. Regular readers might remember a bizzarre episode in June wherein a package mysteriously showed up for me at the address of my former apartment on East 12th Street, … a place I hadn’t lived for about twenty years. When I went over to retrieve the enigmatic package, it ended up being my Devo tickets. Ticketmaster had sent them to the only address they had for me on file. It was only by sheer luck that the guy who took the apartment after me had the good will and consideration to hold onto my phone number. Those tickets could very easily have gone completely astray.

When I got home, my wife obliviously threw the FedEx envelope containing those tickets down the garbage shoot, thinking it was just an empty mailer I’d absent-mindedly left on my bureau. Upon learning that, while I descended into a foamy-mouth depression/rage spiral, my intrepid son Oliver went splelunking in our building’s trash compactor and actually RETRIEVED THE TICKETS!

The fates were playing with me.

As we soldiered on through the summer, however, a bigger problem was brewing. Despite the few highs and many lows of everything that had transpired since March of 2020 – the harrowing death toll, the upending of our normal routines, the crippling inefficacy and duplicitous bullshit of the Trump Administration’s mishandling of the crisis, the promsie of medical science delivering effective vaccines, the inevitable arrival of a more-transmitable mutation of the virus dubbed the Delta Variant – it suddenly became apparent that a staggering number of Americans were skeptical and/or reluctant to get vaccinated, opting instead to espouse conspiracy theories and even champion frankly ludicrous alternatives like horse dewormer to flaunt what they’re now calling “medical tyranny.”

Long story short: Because too many Americans are simply too fucking stupid, COVID-19 is still very much here. As they saying goes, this is why we can’t have nice things.

That means that contrary to our hopes and expectations from back in the Spring, we are very much NOT out of the woods, as yet. As a result, folks responsible for staging and producing events, concerts, festivals and the like are now all questioning whether to go ahead as planned.

DEVO posted this morning – the day before the scheduled performance -- on their Instagram account the following missive:

NYC! We are very sorry to announce that due to circumstances beyond our control and the current state of the world due to Covid 19, we had to postpone our upcoming show at Radio City Music Hall this Tuesday.

We will be announcing a new NYC date for 2022 very shortly. Stay tuned.

Refunds are available from point of purchase and we look forward to seeing you again in NYC soon.

The comments started flowing immediately. Pulling the plug on the event the day before seems like an especially harsh blow, especially for folks who were traveling here, but it’s more than likely that the said decision was made by the global entertainment promoter, Live Nation, and not the band (who have been regularly touting the upcoming date). Some embittered spuds went so far as to suggest that the real reason was low ticket sales, but that doesn’t quite add up. Were that the case, the event would probably have been re-designated to a smaller venue as opposed to being postponed entirely.

Personally speaking, I am pretty goddamned disappointed. As invoked numerous times here, Devo’s 1981 show at Radio City Music Hall was my first-ever concert and verily a life-changing and trajectory-informing experience. The thought of seeing them again in that amazing room was genuinely thrilling for me.

But, … I get it. I’m not happy about it, but because we collectively are too fucking slackjawed to get our shit together, it’s not safe or prudent to hold this event right now. So be it. If ever it becomes safe again, … I’ll be ready.

Get vaxxed or get fucked.

Shot Down

Today in silly news that really doesn’t matter,....I am once again in "Facebook Jail."

A friend of mine posted that he’d landed tickets for a performance by Scottish post-punk funkateers APB. In turn, I responded to his enthusiasm by quoting a line from their signature single and WLIR staple, “I WOULD LIKE TA SHOOOT YA DOWN-UH!” Now, for apparently "violating community standards," I am barred from posting on the platform for a week.

This is, of course, not the first time I've been behind Facebook's virtual bars. I was once banned for 24 hours for re-posting a picture of the January 6 insurrectionists. On another occasion, when a dear friend of mine made a jocular comment disparaging the merits of my beloved Killing Joke, I responded in kind that I knew where he lived and could murder him in his sleep. That got my restricted for three days. This past July, meanwhile, upon answering the query: "GIVE THE VERY BEST ADICE USING ONLY FOUR WORDS," I submitted: "Love Trump? Kill Yourself!"  That cost me three more days for "bullying."

Do better, Facebook. 

This, incidentally, is "Shoot You Down" by APB.

Word On The Street

For more information, visit: SAVESOHONOHO.COM

The End of Summer Survey 2021

Ahoy from the unstable eye of Tropical Storm Henri (formerly Hurricane Henri) out here in Quogue, on the south shore of what Public Enemy used to call “Strong Island.” For the past several days, we’ve been bracing for the arrival of this weather event, but now that it’s finally here, it’s sort of mercifully anticlimactic, … or thus far, I should say. We haven’t gotten any heavy winds, yet, but the torrential downpours have been pretty steady since very early this morning. We’ll see what the rest of the day brings.

In the interim, being that my family is basically packing up and heading back to the city for good, later this week, I’m inclined to suggest that Summer 2021 … a heady cocktail of hope, expectation, cynicism and disappointment, is basically over. As such, I’m exhuming the annual summer survey, … like it matters. Here we go...

Defining Moment of Summer 2021:

While there were plenty of news events from the past couple of months that could act as pivotal moments to sum up the season — from our nationwide failure to contain the advance of the Delta Variant to the inevitably botched withdrawal from Afghanistan — I’m going to scale this question down to a personal level. For us, we spent much of June, July and August traipsing around the Eastern Seaboard, from Upstate New York to Vermont to Massachusetts to Connecticut to Maine and back again, depositing and fetching one child from summer camp and touring prospective college campuses with the other. On one particular evening in the sleepy town of Westport, New York on the shores of Lake Champlain, I both broke a tooth eating shrimp cocktail (no small feat) and, on the creeky front porch of a dilapidated inn we were inexplicably staying at, heard a roughshod husband-&-wife acoustic folk duo launch unexpectedly into a melody-free rendition of “Naked Girl Falling Down the Stairs” by The Cramps. I’d say that bizarre evening pretty much encapsulated Summer 2021, for me.

Best Purchase of Summer 2021:

I actually don’t recall buying that much of anything, this past summer, but I did snag a truly crucial beer-can-chicken stand from True Value in Westhampton that did a magisterial job of keeping our poultry dutifully erect during the indirect grilling portion of the preparation. I was quite pleased with that.

Best Book You Read of Summer 2021:

I really lucked out, this year, as with only one minor exception (a memoir I neglected to finish by a certain noted photographer that I’m sure I’ll go back to), everything I read was pretty compelling. I started off with “Fallopian Rhapsody: The Story of the Lunachicks” by Jeanne Fury, then dove right into the stately “Substance: Inside New Order” by the mighty Peter Hook and then into the suitably grisly “Chaos: Charles Manson, The CIA and the Secret History of the Sixties” by Tom O’Neill. All were entirely excellent. Right now, I’m almost a third into “The History of Bones,” the long-awaited memoir by musician/actor/painter/perennial cool cat (and sometimes Flaming Pablum reader and commenter) John Lurie, and it’s totally engaging, thus far.

Best Movie You Saw During Summer 2021:

I have yet to re-enter any movie theaters, but I did see a clutch of new films — mostly documentaries — over the past couple of months. I, of course, watched “Roadrunner,” the doc about Anthony Bourdain. While quite compelling, it was inevitably crazy depressing. I realize there was a big stink about some A.I.-enhancement of Bourdain’s voice, but I was more put off by the editorial slant in the final third of the film regarding the man’s fraught relationship with Asia Argento. I would recommend it, but that aspect kind of put me off, a bit, as it not-so-subtly sought to assign a convenient villain to story far too complex for such a tidy conclusion, … in my opinion.

I neglected to watch “Val,” the documentary about notedly eccentric actor Val Kilmer as, upon watching the trailer, it, too, seemed irretrievably depressing. The Music Box doc on “Woodstock `99” was also both wildly engaging and wholly dispiriting, so much so that I had to cleanse myself with “We Are Twisted Fucking Sister,” a great film from 2014 about … well, take a guess … that was way better than it had any right to be.

But probably the best thing I saw all summer was earlier this week, when my friend Rob C and I were invited to a private screening of “The War is Never Over,” Beth B’s long-in-the-works documentary about the inimitable Lydia Lunch. Shown in the incongruously plush penthouse apartment of a cinema-benefactor I shall not name, it was a somewhat striking dichotomy to watch Lydia’s unflinchingly visceral story play out in front of this select audience of cloyingly young invitees mostly comprised of aspiring-film types who had zero idea who Lydia Lunch is. The film, of course, pulls few punches, so it was fun catching a few attendees visibly recoiling at certain points. If you’re a fan of the great lady, you need to see it. Lydia herself actually showed up at the end for a Q&A. I got to ask a few questions of her, which was fun. In typical form, she minced no words and got worked up a few times in her own signature manner. I’d have loved to get a picture with her, but I didn’t want to hassle her like a fawning fanboy. My friend Rob, meanwhile, came face to face with her at one point in the kitchen after the film, and somehow managed to get both a hug and a polite kiss from her. Cheeky bastard.

Best Gift You Received of Summer 2021:

Somewhere in Maine, my wife found me a pair of socks with depictions of ducks and the legend “FUCK OFF” all over them. Priceless.

Biggest Loss of Summer 2021:

I was genuinely pretty sad to learn of the passing of ZZ Top bassist Dusty Hill. I don’t care if you’re a punk or a metalhead or a hip-hopper or a rudeboy or a Deadhead or whatever — if you can’t appreciate the singular majesty of ZZ Top, you’re a fucking dolt.

Song That Best Sums Up Summer 2021:

As mentioned back on this post, I listened to a whole slew of different stuff over the course of the summer. I don’t know that I can cite a single tune, however, that ties it all up for me. For whatever reason, here at the cottage, my wife had a habit of playing a whole bunch of Neil Young whenever we were routinely over-imbibing on the back deck. She likes the mellower stuff like “Harvest Moon” and “After the Gold Rush,” whereas I much prefer the angrier fare like “Southern Man” and “Hey Hey, My My (Into the Black),” the latter usually finding her scrambling for the remote.

Happiest Memory of Summer 2021:

While this summer certainly had its share of discouraging moments, I will say that it was, by and large, a happy season. We quite enjoyed our car trips around the wilds of New England. I had a great catch-up with my old friend Rob D. (not the same Rob as mentioned above) at a great outdoor bar in New London, CT on our way to collect Oliver from camp, which found me laughing out loud more than I’ve done in a long damn time.

Saddest Memory of Summer 2021:

Ah, why dwell on it?

Scariest Memory of Summer 2021:

I don’t know that I felt any genuine fear over this summer, but the encroaching dread brought on by embarrassingly large swathes of the American populace continuing to stupidly ignore the recommendations of the medical community gives me concern for what the next few months might bring.

Word That Best Describes Summer 2021:

Almost.

Real Talk, Greenwich Village Style

For The Skeptical & Proudly Ignorant...

Let's stop blaming the Delta Variant, shall we? I mean, the virus is just doing what viruses do. Modern medical science *GAVE US* a way out of this, but depressingly vast swathes of the populace are still too stubborn, selfish, skeptical and *FUCKING STUPID* to take it. THEY'RE the reason we're still in this mess, not the virus.

Sounds In The Summertime

For the last month — and for the conceivable next month -- myself and my little family are sequestered back out at the so-called Lamb Cottage out here on Long Island, the same little house we sub-letted last summer, when the pandemic convinced our friends who normally rent it to stay put in their North Carolina home. As fate would have it, that same family demurred from coming up north this summer, too, so they graciously let us sublet it again for July and August, and it’s a true gift for us to be able to do it.

This all said, while this little cottage was a literal safe haven for us last year and an idyllic place for us to undeservedly sojourn this year, it does have its minor drawbacks.

Sandwiched on all sides by other properties, the cottage comes with two specific sets of neighbors — we call them Jersey House and Staten Island House — who each harbor penchants for, shall we say, sharply compromising the idyll.

Closest is Jersey House, a sprawling, fully-air conditioned suburban compound with a lavish backyard pool that is just over a fenced hedge from us. The residents of same are a family of five who keep a strange weekly schedule that flies in the face of the calendar’s conventions. They oddly disappear for days, out of synch with the weekday/weekend continuum. When they are here, however, their kids spend an inordinate amount of time in the pool. There is, of course, nothing wrong with that. Had we our own pool, we’d probably do the same.

By the same token, the Jersey House kids conduct themselves in the pool in a manner that is best described as … well … feral. Now, don’t get me wrong — obviously, children frolicking in swimming pools is very literally the sound of summertime. When my own kids were little, they giggled their heads off whilst playing in my mother’s pool. But these kids are just … different. They are MANIC, and sound like they are in dire need of some weapons-grade dosages of Ritalin. They scream, rant, rage, moan and bellow in a manner that gives me concern, and I don’t even like these children. Never mind the fact that they irritate the bejesus out of us, I can’t fathom how their own parents stand it. There is no calm. There is no peace. When they play “Marco Polo,” — and they are ALWAYS PLAYING “MARCO POLO,” a strange, maddening constant, given the mind-numbing idiocy of the game — they scream as if their next meal singularly depends on winning.

Last year, we politely asked, on a few awkward occasions, if they could try to keep all the bug-eyed, vein-popping screaming to a minimum. By the end of that summer, we were brazenly yelling “FOR THE LOVE OF GOD, CALM THE HELL DOWN AND SHUT THE FUCK UP” out our bedroom window (the one that faces their pool). Nothing ever changed.

Across the narrow driveway on the other side, meanwhile, is Staten Island House. That’s a whole `nother story.

A massive, multi-bedroomed stronghold with multiple cars coming and going and yet another sprawling backyard pool set-up, Staten Island House plays host to a horde of folks from, we assume, Staten Island, who dependably like to regularly juxtapose the otherwise sleepy tranquility of the surrounding environs (Jersey House notwithstanding) with their pronounced affinity for high-decibel partying. Again, situated as they are between a cluster of other houses, to say nothing of the police station just a block away, the residents of Staten Island House suffer from what my wife calls a dearth of “situational awareness.” I find that diagnosis a little charitable, sooner suggesting that they proudly exude a palpable case of “pugnacious situational indifference.” Routinely opting for rafter-shaking airings from the discographies of Billy Squier, Pat Benatar and Rupert Hine (man oh man, do they love “Escape [The Pina Colada Song]”) in a manner suggesting that 1981 never ended, the S.I. House practically dares me to come complain. Thus far, I have demurred from that option.

Last summer, there was a moment when I was working away at my laptop in the living room, when I heard a group of people walking up the cottage’s long, gravel driveway. I looked out the screen door to see a phalanx of angry-looking women in lycra activewear standing outside in a sort of attack formation. “Can I help you?,” I asked. The leader, a tough-talking lady brandishing a metal water bottle somewhat menacingly, spoke up. “Hey there, Paul, why did you call the cops on us last night?” “Well,” I calmly replied, “for a start, my name isn’t Paul, and we didn’t call the cops on anyone last night or ever. We’re not really ‘call-the-cops’ types, here.” She didn’t seem to buy it and went on to assert that they were just blowing off steam and having a party with some of their friends after a long work week (seemingly oblivious to the fact that the party in question happened on a Monday night). I re-iterated that we hadn’t called the police on them, which was true. Being that we’re ultimately only guests of our friends here, we don’t really feel its our place to alert the local constabulary of any noise disturbance (despite the fact that I’m dead sure the police station a block away could easily hear Staten Island House’s stentorian spins of “Love Is A Battlefield” the evening prior). Bear in mind, these ladies didn’t come down our driveway with a conciliatory bottle of wine to offer — just grimaces and lycra. They took off back down our driveway, and that was our last interaction. But the late-night arena-rock blocks have continued unabated.

Once again, we’re inclined to just grin and bear it, as the benefits of spending time here at the cottage vastly outweigh the drawbacks. If that means dealing with the bloodcurdling screams of Jersey House’s pool and the foundation-quaking renditions of “The Stroke” from Staten Island House, so be it.

Earlier this week, however, I had to repair back to the city. After the remains of a botched root canal in the back of my mouth finally saw fit to dislodge themselves from my skull two weeks back, I figured it was high time to go see my dentist again. I made an appointment for early Tuesday morning, and, in short order, I found myself back in our apartment in the city, late Monday night, without my wife and kids and bored.

Left to my own devices, I ended up drinking a tallboy (or two) of Asahi while re-watching “The New York Post-Punk Noise Series Vol. 1” DVD, which features — wait for it — Cop Shoot Cop performing live at Martin Bisi’s studio in 1993. Without my wife there to helpfully remind (read: scold) me about the perils of volume, I ended up particularly reveling in this vintage slice of clangy noise rock. Evidently, I was enjoying it with a little too much abandon, as halfway through a pointedly caustic rendition of “Shine On Elizabeth,” I heard an emphatic pounding on my front door.

Shaken and shocked to my senses, I muted the television and sprang to the door. I was greeted by Ben, my gentle giant of a downstairs neighbor who could easily collapse my pipe-cleaner-like ribcage with a single poke to my sternum. He’d been dispatched with all haste upstairs by his seething wife to ask me to turn it the Hell down, half-expecting to have encountered one of my teenaged kids as the culprit. Essentially, imagine hearing this coming through your ceiling at top volume. I apologized profusely and trotted out some half-assed excuse that held no water and made absolutely no sense whatsoever. Exceptionally good dude that he is, Ben graciously accepted my drivel, thanked me and split to go soothe the nerves of his hysterical spouse. I spent the rest of the evening on my tip-toes feeling like a first-class jackass.

I am a filthy hypocrite.

The takeaway, here, is whether you’re a city mouse or an ersatz country mouse, never lose touch with your situational awareness.