01. Writer
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Brian Stout

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02. Theme
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Found

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03. MUSIC INSPIRATION
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Jawbreaker:
Unlisted Track

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04. WRITING
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When I was in my twenties, I used to go places on my own because I was impatient with waiting for other people to be available. I didn’t want to miss a thing–not that band, not that one-week only engagement of that Sundance Audience Award Winner, not that fully-restored print.

Now I go places on my own because I’ve (theoretically) aged out of a lot of the things I still love and I’m unwilling to relinquish them. It is liberating to be at a show and give zero fucks about how I am perceived.

I wish someone would have told me when I was 17 that no one cares at all about what you are doing, who you are there with, which band shirt you have on, or how you choose to show your appreciation for the music, as long as you’re not hurting anyone around you.

These days, I’m even more invisible, and I genuinely don’t mind. It’s fun to be carefree at shows, and if anything, it gives me a tinge of sadness that I spent so much time feeling like I couldn’t just be myself.

In this mindset, I walked a few blocks from my hotel to the House of Blues. I first saw Jawbreaker a little over 25 years ago. The first time was the culmination of a few weeks of nonstop Dear You listening. From the moment I finished my first listen to 24 Hour Revenge Therapy, it quickly became canon, spoken about the way people talked about The Replacements’ Let it Be ten years before.

On a Saturday afternoon in September 1995, I went to my favorite record store, the one that sold CDs as soon as they arrived rather than waiting for official release dates, to pick up Dear You. It was what I expected in many ways. Major label debuts always had bigger production, more complicated songs. I had no idea this is what I wanted from Jawbreaker, but it turned out to be exactly what I wanted. The sample at the end of “Jet Black” made me run out to Blockbuster Video to grab a VHS of Annie Hall. That became an obsession, too.

That night, I found myself standing on the main floor near an old friend from back home, just like someone in one of Jawbreaker’s songs might be. I stood there shouting the words with quivering lips under my mask and tears in my eyes at times, overwhelmed by the experience of it all–the band I’ve loved for over 25 years playing the songs that comforted me, made me laugh, gave me space to sulk and wallow, but now make me glad I got past all that sadness of my teens and twenties.

What wrecked me was the passage of time–these songs hit even harder now that I have real-life to tie them to. Back in 1995, it was me connecting to some sort of preview of adulthood. I had very little real life happen to me yet. I had barely any kisses to my name, let alone the one million referenced in the centerpiece of Dear You. 

It would be easy for me to look back and pretend like those were imaginary dramas of me being too scared to talk to girls and devastated when I wasn’t and it didn’t work out. But I can’t dismiss those feelings, nor should I. I’ll need to remember that as my kids age, too, to take their lives and their feelings seriously. 

If anything, the songs resonate even more so now. When I was young and I spiraled over every date that didn’t go well, every unrequited crush, every “no” that followed an awkward me asking someone on a date, the authentic sadness of those songs was what I connected with. “It hasn’t been my day for a couple years. What’s a couple more?” is just vague enough to fit much of that period of my life, even if my adult self would say, “You have no idea what’s coming.”

Seeing someone I liked out with someone new made me listen to “Sluttering (May 4th)” on repeat. And then I’d follow that to “Jet Black” and it’s “If you don’t ask I won’t upset you.” I tried to convince myself I could be Jet Black to the center.

“Million” once filled me with longing for a first serious love, or something like love. Now, I feel weary from pursuing, trying, and failing, but still hoping something will stick. I stood there, awash in all these feelings coming from insights that seemed to just be happening to me in those moments. See the prize but you can’t have it.

I stood there tearfully singing along to “Basilica,” thinking of how I’d certainly felt as low as the friend in that song and I’d talked to friends who also felt that low, how we’d managed to keep each other going. The catharsis of the end of the song rang out, and I walked out into the night after a stop at the merch table. I still need this, now more than ever.

01. Writer
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Brian Stout

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02. Theme
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Work

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03. MUSIC INSPIRATION
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Spanish Love Songs:
Losers 2

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04. WRITING
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Sun in my eyes, windows down. I was singing loudly the frivolous pop of Phoenix’s “1901,” which did its best to insulate me from reality that late Friday morning in May 2009.

“Falling, falling, falling.” 

How apros-pos. I had just been fired from a job for the first time in my 17 working years. Still, there was enough going on to make this feel somewhat insignificant. Mom was sick. We found out in January.

At the time, research showed that Friday is the best day to fire someone, and surely that was a consideration. I haven’t kept up with the research (or found out how it works over Zoom, fortunately), but I know people text my current company’s HR department to say “I quit,” so could “You’re fired” be delivered the same way?

For a moment, I felt free, relieved. It was a swirl of that, along with anger and determination to show those elitist fucks I’d do better than them. I got down to the corner before I remembered that stupid pedometer was still hooked on my belt. They wanted us to wear them and try to clock 10,000 steps per day, just like the CEO did, a Steve Jobs wannabe who wore the same fucking dad jeans and black turtleneck every day.

I passed a co-worker or two on my way back to my car. I avoided eye contact after the first one. I wasn’t sure what else to do, so I was on my way to see my parents. I had a passing thought about how I was pissed that I skipped the Yeah Yeah Yeahs show two days prior, instead staying up late trying to meet expectations I knew I’d never meet.

The month leading up to this was hard. A meeting notice sent by my supervisor with no subject, which I’ve come to fear ever since. A set of absurd “assignments” on top of my usual work that we’re supposed to “demonstrate my commitment to the company’s success,” as though I was going to sink this ship that had just been purchased by Johnson and Fucking Johnson. Jump through these fire rings without so much as a singed hair or you’re out.

I should have just quit at that meeting, but I felt like I’d been punched in the gut. I limped back to my desk feeling like I was dying inside. I’d never been told my work wasn’t worthy. My friendship, yes. My affection and attention, yes. But I could always count on success at work.

I had set aside other parts of my life to put all my chips on succeeding in work. I allowed school and jobs to devour my late twenties, with my eyes fixed upon a meteoric rise for myself that I was already late getting started. I put my energy where I knew I could succeed, and it had been going according to plan. 

But then all of a sudden, it wasn’t.  The bottom had fallen out of everything. And at that point, I couldn’t see what was to come–a year of losing my mom, moving home because I was out of money and still unemployed, seeing my once-perfect credit score slip, and looking to faith for answers that never came. My mom died while my life was still a massive question mark, and that haunts me to this day. I don’t believe in something more anymore. I told my kids the best you can hope for is that the good stories will outlive you by a generation, maybe two. 

The “showed them” moment never arrived. Interview after interview, fake smile after fake smile, dashed hope after dashed hope. After a year on unemployment with no career opportunities on the horizon, I wound up back in retail, doing the same job I once did to keep myself in a crummy one bedroom while I wrote my papers and listened to Aesop Rock and Jets to Brazil, planning for a life where I’d be tenured and teaching composition, running a writing center. 

This time, I was trying to pick up my pieces while I helped the wealthiest people in Oakland County pick out bottles of fancy wine and find their vitamins. I hoped I wouldn’t run into one of my graduate school friends, me standing there filling up the Kombucha again before yoga class around the corner wrapped up. I endured verbal abuse from entitled assholes. I helped Geoffrey Fieger buy vitamins and gawked at Barry Sanders. I laughed at the inflated drama of One Percent Problems, but I kind of wished they were mine. I tried not to let it break me. After a few months of Nothing Better, it’s hard not to start telling yourself it would be fine to do this forever, to consider the idea that your goals and aspirations had been undone and may not get back on track. Things being tough all over provides only intermittent comfort.

01. Writer
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Brian Stout

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02. Theme
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Distant

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03. MUSIC INSPIRATION
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The National:
Light Years

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04. WRITING
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It starts easily enough. Not innocently, but easily. It might be a fight that neither person wants to back down from that ends with one person going to bed.

Never go to bed angry, I heard. How is that even possible without feeling like you’re giving in all the time?

It turns into staying up later. Falling asleep on the couch with a laptop. A half-remembered episode of some series only you want to watch or songs only you like playing through headphones.

You’re not the only one feeling it. What about those books? The therapy? The articles you read over lunch? It’s like you’re not speaking the same language.

Then it spills over into the next day. Quiet morning coffee and a halfhearted well-wish.

A couple meaningless texts during the day. Maybe about picking up something or the weekend’s plans. That one is especially comforting (or constricting, depending on your mood). This will go on at least through the weekend.

By the time you get home from work, it’s not active. It’s lingering in the air, resentment bearing down on shoulders. Maybe it’s more like a land mine that’s buried beneath the couch or carpet, waiting for a wrong response to blow the whole thing open again. Maybe it happens months from now. Maybe you step on it on the way to bed or when you’re getting ready for sex or right after. It might be a word or a thought that takes your mind out of what’s happening. If you’re always ready for battle, you never recover from the fatigue.

Sometimes it gets better for a while, but it’s hard to trust. You wrack your brain trying to crack the code. How do you make this stay? After a while, you just assume there are landmines everywhere. Some are dormant, some are live.

And the worst part is, you’re better than this. You both are. There are years and years of memories of things you never thought you’d be, never thought you’d say, never thought you’d do. And you’re not the only one.

For some reason, you’re not able to connect the fucking dots. It might look good on paper or for a few hours when there’s company but that’s it.

 A lot forgiven, little forgotten.

01. Writer
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Brian Stout

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02. Theme
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Almost

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03. MUSIC INSPIRATION
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Tigers Jaw:
Window

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04. WRITING
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Looking back, I see that I almost understood so much when I was younger. It wasn’t for lack of trying. Heartache and sadness I experienced vicariously through movies, music, books, and friends kept me moping for years. I thought it made me deep. It wasn’t worthless, because it helped me expand my empathy. But it also kept me trapped in that limbo for years, hoping something would happen that tied my life experience to these songs I was feeling so deeply.

When everyone around me was living through the tumultuous times of early serious relationships, I was trying hard to have them, but never getting there. I didn’t have much to be sad about except feeling lonely; not that that’s nothing.

Now, I’m in a better place to understand it. I finally got around to having some grown up love and heartache in the past fifteen or so years, and it’s so much more painful to hear those same songs that expertly captured real pain now.  

The line is everywhere, and far more dangerous. One song capturing the whole of my experience…that’s just not reality. We connect in moments and lines. I know there are classic divorce records, and I’ve listened to some of them, but they’re not my life. My divorce wasn’t (and isn’t) like Blood on the Tracks or Shoot Out the Lights or Domestica.

In the end, what’s the difference how it all went wrong?

Right now, the last Jimmy Eat World record has some truths and insights about splitting up that I find unexpected, especially after learning that the songwriter didn’t actually get divorced. The spell was broken when I read an article where a fan said something like, “You can make a movie about killing someone without really doing it, so why not?” I was mad, but how could I feel betrayed when I found out someone else hadn’t gone through a divorce and was still happily married? Furthermore, wasn’t I doing something similar when I adhered so closely to songs about possibly real pain when I hadn’t experienced it?

I used to think that the songs were the whole self-contained story, that I’d have my own someday. Now I see that the jagged lines and images are far more powerful than finding My Song because they’re everywhere. I no longer have to reach. I can hear lines like these from “Window” and I know their sting in real life.

I found myself in a darker place
Afraid of change but more afraid to stay the same

Once I was trying to force myself to feel something that now comes flooding in whether I like it or not. Lines come out of nowhere to fuck me up--ones I hadn’t thought much about before, ones that I thought I was feeling deeply years ago now make my lip quiver and bring on the tears. In reflecting on this, I realized that these reactions came from trying hard at life instead of trying to connect to someone else’s blues.

These days, I’ve taken to “I’m here. I’m here. Not heroic, but I try,” sung by Frightened Rabbit’s Scott Hutchison, a man who isn’t here anymore, a man who’s music scored a handful of sentimental moments in my life and who ended his life last year just after the beginning of the end of my marriage. Let the lines break you. Let them mend you.

01. Writer
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Brian Stout

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02. Theme
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Elevation

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03. MUSIC INSPIRATION
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Speedy Ortiz:
Raising the Skate

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04. WRITING
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As soon as she could string together a couple words at a time, I taught my daughter to say, “I’m not bossy. I’m the boss.” I’d read a few articles around that time addressing the tendency to call women “bossy” rather than “confident” or “visionary.”

Well, fuck that.

As a new dad to this little girl, I wanted her to feel like it is natural to lead and to expect that others will listen and respond to her. Her parents have both had (and still have) issues with assertiveness and self-confidence, and the desire of all parents to guide their kids past their own foibles to something better.

Fortunately, her self-confidence currently outstrips her mom’s, her brother’s, and mine. She dances as if no one is watching every time “Let It Go” comes up in Frozen, twirling in circle after circle and encouraging her big brother to join in. She nods her head with her eyes closed when we listen to “All the Stars” in the car. She gleefully shouts the “Hey!” in Taylor Swift’s ”Bad Blood” and requests it every time we go for a ride. Music is strength, and I cannot wait to introduce her to Bikini Kill and Sleater-Kinney one day. She is also blessed with a strong woman and musician for a mom. I go along with all the directing that comes with playing hospital or restaurant. I see the determination in her tiny face and eyes and I know my girl is going to be all right.

Sometimes I like to hang back when I am picking her up from school. It is a joy to see her leading on the playground. Kids like her. They listen to her. At home, she is encouraged to speak up positively, to communicate calmly and clearly. She still has toddler tantrums and meltdowns, but she is also extremely perceptive and adept at expressing her feelings.

The mixed blessing of confident children is guiding that undisciplined trait, to teach them to wield it for good. For now, she naturally leads in playgroups and loves to direct our play. She also has a very special mission: eventually advocating for her older brother.

Having children is a tremendous blessing, but it is also a stern reminder of one’s mortality, further amplified by having a child with a disability. The thought that one day I will not be here is always lingering somewhere in the background. I hope that my daughter will fight as hard for my son as we do. Seeing the love they share makes me optimistic. She makes a point of introducing him to her friends. She loves him. I hope there is never a time when she is embarrassed of him because of Down Syndrome. It is not exactly fair, but we are depending on that.

Other parents have told me that school teaches girls to step back, to minimize achievement. I do not recall it from my time in school, but I could imagine it thinking back. She is too bright for that, but I remember coasting through grade school with confidence, only to be derailed by relentless teasing in middle school. I went into a cocoon that I did not emerge from until graduation. For her mom, it was less severe at school, but no one emerges from public education unscathed. And the real world is even worse in many ways. I hope she never has to rebuild the way her parents have, but we hope to instill the determination to do it if she has to.

Chief, not the overthrown. Captain, not a crony. So if you wanna throw, you better have an awfully big stone. How naïve to trample she who’s running the stampede. I’m raising the skate.

01. Writer
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Brian Stout

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02. Theme
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Junk

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03. MUSIC INSPIRATION
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King Missile: Detachable Penis

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04. WRITING
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So this guy has a detachable penis. And then he loses it. He looks everywhere, asks his friends about its whereabouts, and ultimately has to pay seventeen bucks to a street vendor to get it back. The song itself sounds like a bar band hanging out on spoken word open mic night, with a vocal delivery that was an unholy alliance of the MTV Buzz Bin and this. Fifteen minutes of fame ensue. According to Lyric Genius, the notoriety also cost them airplay, but I scarcely remember this being accurate.

How’d they rope Richard Kern into directing? None of his calling cards or grit are on display. The video is as literal as the song, and equally boring. If this happened today, we’d probably have a YouTube channel or Tumblr to keep us informed of its adventures. One million followers for the detachable penis.

Worse yet, they missed the most intriguing part. What was his penis doing during its time away, while Hall was sleeping it off?

We have to stick with Hall because the song’s not called “Talking Penis,” but the video is a missed opportunity.

Did it get mad because he left it someplace? The narrator did mention he frequently loses it. I imagine an underappreciated detachable penis deciding to teach the owner a lesson.

Did they have a fight? Maybe it stormed off, got drunk, and passed out on the street vendor’s blanket? Maybe this is the reason for the frequent separations.

Maybe it was concerned about the prospects for the night, seeking to avoid being put someplace it didn’t want to go? Maybe it was brought out at an inopportune time, and the embarrassment was too much to bear.

Perhaps it jumped into an attractive woman’s purse or an attractive man’s jacket pocket, either to play matchmaker or strike out on its own.

Did it met up with another detachable to paint the town red? Maybe I’ve got it all wrong and Hall tossed it aside because it wasn’t operating as intended?

And what happened at the reunite? Did they embrace? Go get a beer and talk things out? Maybe it was the start of an epic blowout that led to one party moving out. Now they just exchange nods if they see each other from across the crowded room. Was Hall forced to find a new one?

Haven’t heard from John S. Hall for a minute, so I hope he and his penis came to an understanding. Or at least that he’s become more responsible about detachable penis ownership. I’d hate to find out he’s MIA because he’s lost it again.

01. Writer
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Brian Stout

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02. Theme
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Balance

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03. MUSIC INSPIRATION
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Atmosphere:
God Loves Ugly

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04. WRITING
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I moved to Ypsilanti for school in summer 2002. I rented one-bedroom apartment on the wrong side of the tracks of the city that’s on the wrong side of the tracks. Arriving fresh from Flint and being a broke student, I blended. I reveled in the low thump of my neighbors bumping Jay-Z and the contact buzz of my GN’F’N’R-loving neighbor who always blasted those hockey games a little too loud. Poor. Ugly. Happy. Just like the Avail t-shirt. A last blast before adulthood set in.

A few months earlier, I’d discovered that there was a whole world of hip hop talking about more than cars and girls and money. I became obsessed. The message wasn’t all that different from my punk rock and emo favorites from the preceding few years, but somehow it sounded more empowering when rapped. I felt a confidence emanating from it where I thought my indie rock heroes were commiserating and I was encouraged to continue to stare at my belly button. Sean Daley, El-P, Aesop Rock, and peers seemed to say, “Yeah, I’m messed up. What of it? Still got a life to live,” instead of “I’m so sad. Guess I’ll LiveJournal or hunker down in my apartment.” 

Nevertheless, my neck was still sore from gazing at my navel. I moped out to Ryan Adams, Interpol, and Jets to Brazil just like any card-carrying mid-twenties indie rocker did. And I latched onto the relentlessly downbeat one-liners in Control. The influence of Americana seeped in further after 9/11. For most of my friends, the closest we came to patriotism reborn was discovering protest songs from earlier times and bumping “Makeshift Patriot” by Sage Francis.

The CD burning parties started as soon as I hooked up with a couple friends who had also moved to the area from Flint. All of us broke students. All of us music lovers. No Spotify or bargain subscription services to satisfy our need to discover new music.

But we did have computers with CD burners (paid that extra $150 to get that standard on my Dell desktop), and CD-Rs were a bargain at 25 for $25.00. When we were particularly broke, we would even share those. What’s a dollar or two among friends, especially if it meant converting someone to one of your idiosyncratic favorites?

It went like this—once a month on Saturday nights:

1. Bring the last few CDs you bought, including any special requests. Or bring ones you really want to share with others. We were all pretty familiar with each other’s collections.

2. Bring some beer, even if all you can swing is a couple of 40s.

3. Bring your blank CDs, and be willing to share if needed.

I wasn’t convinced that I needed to spend $12 on Bright Eyes’ latest opus, but I was happy to give it a shot for a blank disc. It turned out to be the one that helped me get past the preciousness to see the talent sandwiched in between indulgent intros and long-winded outros. I got to indulge in many bands I’d heard of but not yet heard, like Rilo Kiley, Milemarker, and many others, and to fill in the holes of discographies.

And I was happy to provide another copy of Yankee Hotel Foxtrot or Source Tags and Codes upon request, while encouraging friends to burn a copy of Emergency Rations or Fantastic Damage or Labor Days, too.

We also had great debates. I remember having a heated one over whether Turn on the Bright Lights, YHF, or Source Tags was the best record of 2002.  

Do people still do this in person? Don’t tell me if they don’t. So much of my misspent youth was wrapped up in talking music, raising glasses to the soundtrack of our lives. If not, something major has been lost. It seems like none of us have the time for this in mid-life, and I imagine that's good. Be glad that it happened, be glad that it was.

I wore my scars like the rings on a pimp that year. The next year Atmosphere encouraged me to find a balance. I probably burned that disc a few times for friends, too.

01. Writer
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Brian Stout

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02. Theme
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Cells

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03. MUSIC INSPIRATION
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Constantines:
Soon Enough

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04. WRITING
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“Years from now, they will make water from the reservoirs of our idiot tempers.”

In "Soon Enough" by Constantines, the expectant father paces from room to room, praying for a daughter, because women are winning the tournament of hearts. He is gifted with a son, and he jumps ahead many years to think about this child as a man.

I imagined fatherhood through this song, a highpoint on a beautiful record about the lives most of us lead, quietly remarkable feats like working all the time and loving our families. I never imagined specific characteristics about my hypothetical son, except that maybe he’d look like me or that we might run through the backyard making movies on a Saturday afternoon. Not even what his likes and dislikes might be.

The cells my wife and I shared would make him, and that those cells would make him perfect.

But what do you do when cells don’t act right, when they don’t cooperate?

News of my wife’s pregnancy came at the end of a year-long struggle of tests, treatments, and monthly disappointments, the day after we had our initial consult for IVF. In our thirties, we felt the clock ticking, despite the headlines on Us magazine and others assuring us that we had at least 20 more years of prime baby-making ahead of us.

My wife sent me a text of a pregnancy test. “Pregnant,” it read. I immediately packed up my things and headed home to celebrate. From visions glimpsed during prayers, we were certain we were going to have a little girl. It’s what we knew. Our hearts told us. We thought God told us.

Expectant parents only want to hear one thing: Your baby is healthy. Nothing to worry about. Your cells and his cells got along fine and now you’ve made this little being who will change at least two lives forever, likely more.

On the morning of my wife’s first ultrasound, we were surprised to learn four things.

1.     The little girl we had seen in our dreams was going to be a little boy.

2.     Our little boy would have Down syndrome, which we knew next to nothing about.

3.     A condition called a hygroma was threatening his precious little life. The next few weeks would be critical, but there wasn’t much that could be done to increase the odds of his survival.

4.     The hospital staff expected that we would decide to end the pregnancy.  

Our cells made something unexpected. Something scary and anxiety-inducing. We were angry and terrified rather than elated and excited. This after all those tests, all those medications, all those tears.

Other couples spent their days painting nurseries and collecting gifts. My wife spent a month counting kicks in her stomach while we tried to come up with a name for our little boy. We wondered if we should carry on with the baby shower plans, if we should pick out a name. We also began our research on Down syndrome. We had nearly all the joy of expecting a child sucked from our lives. The life the song made me imagine seemed to be gone.

Thankfully, the hygroma shrunk by the end of the summer, and we were able to look forward to the birth of Noah again. We made it through the worst part. We would be able to call his name and hold him. And that was enough at that point. We had his whole life to learn about Down syndrome.

On October 24, 2013, Noah Grey entered the world smiling. He has many of the expected struggles for an individual with Down syndrome, but he also has remarkable health and an indomitable spirit.

He brings joy every day. He loves dinosaurs, music (anything from “Uptown Funk” to Chance the Rapper), and Up. He drives his little sister crazy. He has impeccable manners. He gives the most amazing hugs. He’s learning to swim and playing t-ball.

Soon enough, work and love will make a man out of him. I’ll get to have those conversations. I’ll get to be there for his firsts. The cells that initially made our world come crashing down found another way forward. And it’s a beautiful path.